This is no chicken little. This is the east coast conifer version of (Chicken of the woods) Laetiporos huroniensis which I happen to notice on a big old eastern hemlock around a 100 feet up a steep bank on trail 2 at the foray.
(Ma i take) a step back now to – who came first the chicken or the hen – and the truth is on the way down to the 2013 N.S. Mycological Society Foray I decided to take a short detour over to a side road in Hants Co. N.S. to see if the red oak that gave me 3 nice (hen of woods) after last year’s Foray was going to be generous again. There wasn’t 3 this time though 1 huge Hen of the woods (Grifola frondosa) was all my basket could handle.
Check out the info and especially the story at the bottom of this mushroom–collecting.com/mushroommaitake.
Now back to this conifer chicken of the woods Laetiporos huroniensis, it is considered by a few people a good edible though 10% or more of the population may experience some GI problems after eating this one. That is a high percentage so it seems good advise to only gather chicken of the woods of hardwoods which will make your mushroom either Laetiporus sulphurous or Laetiporus cincinnatus in New England and Eastern Canada at least, there are a few other varieties out west which seem to be studied a little more than our east coasters. Well time to fly the coop. ciao
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