March / April 2007 Mushroom Log

Botanists Fight to Save American Chestnut

By Jan Kennedy

Ed. Note: The following 3 articles are reprinted from the Dec., 2006 The Spore Print, the Jounal of the Los Angeles Mycological Society, Inc.

Wildlife biologists have restored populations of coyotes, buffalo, bald eagles, osprey and other animals.

Can botanists do the same for the American chestnut?

For thousands of years, the chestnut dominated the forests in the United States, especially east of the Rocky Mountains, according to the American Chestnut Foundation. In many areas, it constituted up to 25 percent of the trees in a forest. High in vitamins and rich in starch and oils, the trees provided a food for people, deer and other animals. Chestnut timber, strong and easy to split, was a favorite in home building.

But in 1904, an American chestnut in the New York City Zoological Park died from an Asian fungus. It was the harbinger of devastation to come; all the trees in New York City were dead by 1912. By 1930, nearly all of them east of Ohio and north of North Carolina had died from the blight. By 1950, nearly all were gone east of the Rockies.

“I don’t know of one in Stark County, but if anyone has one, they won’t tell you,” said Don Myers, who distributes information on the Ohio Buckeye and chestnut trees at the Stark County Fair every year. “They don’t want people coming around pulling off shoots and picking up seeds.”

Botanists began efforts to produce fungus-resistant hybrids in 1930. Progress was slow, but in 1995, with 118 seeds from cross-bred trees, came evidence of immunity.

Experts now believe they are on the brink of success, said Carolyn Kieffer, a professor of botany at Miami University of Ohio’s Middletown campus.

And seedlings planted by the Friends of Fort Laurens at the Revolutionary War site near Bolivar may help.

The blight stopped at the Rocky Mountains, so Fort Laurens got its 25 pure American chestnut seedlings from Montana, said Scott Fisher, a trustee for the Friends of Fort Laurens.

Bringing them East could expose them to the virus (sic) in five to seven years, he said, but an American-Chinese chestnut hybrid that is supposed to be blight resistant is expected to be in circulation within two years.

Virginia botanists have been crossbreeding the American with the Chinese tree – which is immune to the fungus – for generations. Cross-breeding the two resulted in a tree with immunity, but mostly Chinese chestnut genetics.

Crossing that hybrid with another pure American chestnut produced a tree with 75 percent American chestnut characteristics, though it was still immune. Continued crossing has produced a tree whose genetic structure is15/16ths American chestnut yet, again, it still retains the immunity. Genetically, it is indistinguishable from a pure American chestnut, Kieffer said.

The president of the Ohio chapter of the American Chestnut Foundation is Greg Miller of Carroll County, who has built a business around the tree. He’s growing several thousand pure American chestnut seedlings as stock for the Ohio American Chestnut Foundation research program. He also grows the Chinese chestnut as a cash food crop. Predicting how long the pure species can live before the blight gets to it is more art than science, he said.

“Some of the trees can live up to 40 or 50 years before they get the blight,” he said. “It usually starts when the trees reach the stage where the bark starts to split. That provides a point of entry for the fungus.”

11 June 2006. Cantonrep.com

Ed. Note: Ever since I first heard of the Chestnut Blight as a tender undergraduate in 1958, the outlook for any return of the American chestnut to our forests seemed pretty bleak. This article from the Canton (OH) Repository, gives us reason to hope that day might yet arrive. Will a similar solution to the Dutch Elm disease be in the offing? Unfortunately, an insect vector, the elm bark beetle, introduces the fungus when it burrows through and below the bark, which might make a “cure” for harder to come by. But the American chestnut was previously written off, so maybe the elm might come back some day too.

Mushroom Picker Returns to Hunting Ground

By Terry Kirby

When Hampshire police, acting for the Forestry Commission, arrested Brigitte Tee-Hillman in the New Forest one autumn day in 2002, it might have been wise for both bodies to reflect on what they were getting themselves into.

This is, after all, a woman who once owned the world’s largest dog, a great Dane called Sir Galahad, who stood more than 7 ft on his hind legs. This small but feisty woman, was not about to be stopped from doing what she has done regularly for 30 years.

Dogs are one of her many passions, but the greatest of her passions are the wild mushrooms around her home in the forest. It was the defence of her right to pick as many as she likes and to sell them to hotels and chefs that lay behind her arrest.

After four years of legal battles involving a criminal prosecution for theft, and a civil suit over the right to pick on common land-she won both-she has won a unique licence from the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs. She can pick wild fungi for life in the forest. As she said when The Independent (a national newspaper in Britain) joined her on her daily foraging trip this week: “At least it means the Forestry Commission aren’t always watching me when I have a pee in the forest.”

We set off from Gorse Meadow, near Lymington, their guesthouse and mushroom headquarters, with the apron-clad Mrs. Tee, 64, at the wheel of her blue Rolls Royce with her husband John in the passenger seat.

Together they recount their battles with bureaucracy: “Thirty-two court appearances before the judge threw the Criminal case out. Thirty two!” The judge attacked the waste of public money; John, with relish, adds “It’s cost them nearly a million pounds altogether. I had the letter this morning.”

Officialdom sometimes needs her: “The health people in Southampton had these girolles from France they could not identify. They were ticking!” she laughs. “They came from Chernobyl, they were radioactive!”

As a child in southern Germany, mushrooms were a vital food source in the lean postwar years. [this is also how Ernst Both got his start in learning boletes, Ed. note] She became an air stewardess, married and settled in the New Forest. In the mid-70’s, Mrs. Tee began picking and eventually selling the mushrooms.

“Mrs. Tee’s Wild Mushrooms” was doing nicely until 1998 when the Forestry Commission told her not to pick more than the permitted daily 1.5 kilos (3.3 lbs.) Several run-ins later, the commission called in the police.

Mrs. Tee stops the car, dons her ever-present Barbour and takes a sharp left into the bracken, marching deep into the forest. We are after winter chanterelles, and pied de mouton, or “hedgehog” mushrooms. She begins furiously picking away, nipping the small brown fungi just above the root [sic]. “Look,” she says, parting the bracken, “they are everywhere. How can the commission say we are depriving the forest, they know nothing. There’s enough for everyone.”

Heading home, Mrs. Tee tells how, come April, she will be searching the verges of this busy road for the coveted St. George’s mushroom (Calocybe gambosa). “I have to keep my bottom facing away from the cars otherwise I will get hit,” she roars.

The Rolls comes to a sudden halt. “She does this all the time,” says John. And Mrs. Tee is off into the woods in search of something that caught her eye: “Sparassis crispa,” she cries, a small woman in an apron and a determined look in her eye.

25 Nov., 2006. independent.co.uk

Who says you can’t fight City Hall?

Cordyceps, Rare Medicinal Fungus, Cultured

From Chinapost.com, July 7, 2006 via the Los Angeles Mycological Society

Singapore – The technology has been developed to culture microorganisms for large-scale production of a rare Chinese medicinal fungus, a Singapore company said in a published report Thursday. The development has resulted in the cultivation of the Cordyceps sinensis fungus in 9.5 days, compared with 12 months in nature, according to the company, Auric Pacific Nutritech (APN).

“Wild Cordyceps sinensis is only to be found in places like China, Tibet, Nepal, and Qinghai, at altitudes above 3500 meters,” The Business Times quoted APN general manager Mark Xu as saying. This product is rare with “demand greater than supply.”

Studies have found Cordyceps sinensis to contain bioactive compounds that support healthy lung and kidney functions, and anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory properties.

Ed. Note: You may recall the long article by Dan Winkler describing the hunting, harvesting, and selling of these medicinal fungi, reprint-ed in the Mar/Apr, May/June, 2005 issues of the Log. Will this new technology supplant the collecting of wild Cordyceps? Stay tuned!

Book Review by Dick Grimm

Field Guide to Wild Mushrooms of Pennsylvania and the Mid Atlantic by Bill Russell

Reviewed by Dick Grimm

This guide by Mr. Russell indicates to me that it is written by a man who knows wild mushrooming.

The book, for the most part, contains subject matter that has been researched for updated names. Beyond that, it seems the scientific prattle and standard scenario layout has been purposely avoided to better eliminate confusion that typically consumes rank amateurs in guides written by professional mycologists. I think Mr. Russell has successfully surmounted that problem.

On the flip side, the author’s syntax is a bit confusing and tends to ramble more than typical field guide narration. This may not set well with those of literary perfection. Much of the wording does not trickle down from Strunk and White.

There is a different feel about this book that lends itself to the “Pot Hunter” rather than the collector with the love of scientific investigation front and center. There is an undercurrent of dialect that renders the narration and exposition closer to the fork and skillet and the joys of walking the woods. It is a “Homey” prose that would be well taken by many amateurs.

The pictures need some help. Many of the mushrooms do not match the habitat and have been redistributed for the camera. There is nothing wrong with this procedure; we all do it. Yet, it would seem better, at least to me, to reconstruct the picture in a more natural habitat setting. I can see, however, that Mr. Russell’s purpose was obviously to reveal the important diagnostic parts of the mushroom rather than seek praise for the photography. I think he accomplished this well. Mushrooms presented in palms, fingers and thumbs, however, do lose a little of their aesthetic value.

The single most important feature was listing and coordinating the data and plates into seasonal assemblage. Even though this typically overlaps to some degree, Russell did a good job with a complicated task.

Mine is not to critique species, but Aminata muscaria (plate 21) seems to me to better fit A. frostiana.

In summary: this guide could readily join the parade of “show and tell” guides like many others on the market. The main difference being the story telling manner in which it is presented that would please some but be objectionable to others. Also, the seasonal presentation of the species was well received by me.

Dual-action Bacterium Fights Fungal Infection In Crops

By Hawk Jia in Beijing China.

Ed. Note: Things get pretty complicated in the soil ecosystem in which fungi and bacteria compete for their space in the darkness.

Chinese scientists have developed a bacterium-based product that can boost plants’ growth while protecting them from harmful fungal infection.

Although the research is still at an early stage, the researchers hope that further trials of the product in a variety of crops will identify its usefulness for dry regions around the globe.

Called IB12, the product is made of Bacillus subtilis—a bacterium widely used as an additive in the fodder industry to improve digestion—and compounds that help the bacterium grow.

Fungal infections can seriously harm plants, causing severe disease such as leaf blast in cotton and potato crops.

B. subtilis can counter the action of fungi in a number of ways. In soil, it has been found to swiftly bind to areas on plant roots infected by fungi. Here it competes more powerfully for nutrition, starving the fungi.

The bacterium can also secrete chemicals that inhibit fungal growth, as well as hormones that stimulate the growth of its host plants.

Li Jiudi of the CAS Institute of Botany has developed IB12 over the past decade, researching varieties of B. subtilis local to many parts of western China and identifying compounds that boost its growth. Li has also studied how to purify the bacterium so that the biological product produces consistent results.

Xu Zhaoliang, also at the botany institute, chaired the group evaluating IB12.

He found that IB12 can reduce fungal diseases in cotton by 20-25 percent, and increase its output by over 12 percent.

While research on the effect of IB12 on fungal diseases in potatoes is at too early a stage to see definite results, Xu and his team have already noted that IB12-treated potato tubers are much bigger than those not treated with the bacterium.

There have been some previous studies on B. subtilis, but IB12 is the first to be adapted to the environmental conditions in western China.

It might be among the first B. subtilis-based products to be commercialized in China, Xu told SciDev.Net.

Reported in SciDev.Net website on 23 Oct, 2006.

Quite a story! – Postia ptychogaster

By Tony Wright

Reprinted with the author’s permission from the January-March, 2007 issue of MYCELIUM, The Newsletter of the Mycological Society of Toronto.

Relaxing in September, well away from the city, I found a slime mould and wanted to confirm my suspicion that it was Mucilago crustacea. Having no reference books with me that afternoon, I turned instead to the internet to find relevant pictures, and fortunately found several to satisfy my curiosity.

One of those pictures was on an intriguing UK website www.mushooms.org.uk (based in Sussex, where I was born) .….it had a “Rogues Gallery” page with annotated photographs of species that they had not been able to identify, and a general appeal for help in naming them; so I browsed though these “unknowns”. There were none that I readily recognized, but one of them, which had been posted on the site since 2003, was so unusual that I thought “My! That’s so strange and different…what on earth could it possibly be?”

Later after supper, I decided to go back on the net and see if the Montreal society (Le Cercle des mycologues de Montréal - http://mycomontreal.qc.ca) had anything new and interesting for me on their website. Clicking on the “What’s New?” page I found an article titled Le Polypore oursin (The urchin polypore). This illustrated August 2005 article by Yves Lamoureux recounts the fascinating story stemming from their annual Mycology Week where specimens are laid out with names for public display. Almost every year for some 15 years a small fungus growing on wood, and looking much like a soft spiky puffball had been placed on the tables and nobody was able to categorize it at all, let alone to genus and species; the best they could do was to label it more or less as “an unknown in its formative stage”. In 2002 Raymond Boyer in Sept-Iles sent fresh specimens of this fungus to Yves Lamoureux in a cooler, on a bus for many hours, noting that it might be a Hericium. Yves Lamoureux examined the fungus, concluded that it did not have the right characteristics for a Hericium, and decided to get to the bottom of this mystery. He emailed a photo of the fungus to Serge Audet, the polypore expert in Quebec, who replied immediately and categorically “It’s the asexual form of the polypore Postia ptychogaster.” A fun story with a happy conclusion.

But wait! Bells are ringing in my head! This Montreal mystery fungus looks much like the “unknown” I saw a few hours ago on the UK Rogues Gallery! It was time for me to do some detective work: a Google search for “Postia ptychogaster”, and for all its synonyms listed in IndexFungorum.org, and then a review of the results. It seems that this fungus could be described as a spiky marshmallow with a brown powdery puffball-like centre when mature. After considering all the pictures and words, mostly from Europe where it seems to be fairly widespread, I concluded that the UK “unknown” was indeed “probably” Postia ptychogaster. I emailed Matthew Hutchings at the UK website and suggested he check out this name for his “unknown”. After checking, he agreed I may well be correct, and added this possible name to his website photo, awaiting another similar find for confirmation.

Back home later in Toronto, I find that NAMA’s Annual Forays since 1962 have recorded this species only once (California, 1978). My most informative source was Bruno Boulet’s 2003 book, Les champignons des arbres de l’est de l’Amérique du Nord, a Quebec publication, where he provides a full description of this late summer or fall polypore. It has two forms; a poroid form producing normal spores, and an anamorphic asexual form producing chlamydospores. The UK and Montreal specimens pictured were of the anamorphic form. Bruno Boulet shows no record of this species in eastern North America other than from Quebec, saying this fungus is rarely collected and is practically unknown to mycologists; although he does not think that it is as rare in this temperate climate as it seems, he says it should nonetheless appear on the list of Quebec’s precarious species. He says its disconcerting form discourages mycologists from collecting and studying it, but that, once alerted, they will easily recognize it in the field. George Barron, on his website (at http://www.uoguelph.ca/~gbarron/WESTERN2/tyroptyc.htm), has an amazing photo of it with both forms on the same fruiting body (under the synonym Tyromyces ptychogaster; the genus Oligoporus has also been used), commenting that it is a western species that he has never seen in the east.

The story does not end there, as my wife, Marianna, and I continued to enjoy the fine fall weather. We are out on our MST foray of October 18, when she calls me over to an old felled conifer log, “Come and look at these.” There are three species growing there. I focus on a round white one about two inches wide…what is it?...it is... it can’t be…this is unbelievable …it’s the UK “unknown”!…it’s the Montreal mystery!…(In the field I cannot impress my colleagues by telling them its name because, in my excitement, I cannot recall the words Postia ptychogaster).

Amazed by our remarkable find, we collect the specimen, take a few photos and later check it out under the microscope. To be sure of the identification I send a photo to Serge Audet and Yves Lamoureux, who confirm my determination. I check with Ottawa’s herbarium and they have three specimens of this species, all from the province of Quebec (1930, 1938 and 1988); Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum herbarium has none.

This collection is shaping up as the first documented record of Postia ptychogaster in Ontario. Quite a story!

My thanks to Serge Audet for sharing his expert knowledge, and to Yves Lamoureux for his prior detective work.

Ed.Note: This article illustrates nicely the enormous influence the internet holds for far flung communications amongst fungi fans as well as professional mycologists and its potential for problem solving in the identification of unusual specimens. So the next time you’re stumped about some unknown fungal find, get out there and start surfing the web. It’s not just for pedophiles or neo-Nazis anymore!

On a less flippant note, it is NOT common for fungi in the Basidiomycetes (the large group comprising mushrooms, puffballs, boletes, pore-fungi, etc., which is mostly what we find on our forays) to exhibit sexual and asexual forms the way this Postia does. However, in the Ascomycetes group (which includes morels, false morels, cup fungi, truffles, and many microscopic forms) such sexual and asexual forms occur abundantly. The 2 forms are distinct and were often collected separately and given separate names before their being just 2 forms of the same fungus was appreciated.

Postia ptychogaster

Cut to reveal powdery interior

Photo: J. Sparling

World’s oddest Creature at risk from Killer Fungus

By Kathy Marks

It is a unique Australian creature—a mammal that lays eggs and has a furry body, a bill like a duck’s, and webbed feet. The males are also poisonous. But in Tasmania, one of its principal habitats, the platypus is under threat from mucormycosis, a deadly disease caused by Mucor amphiborum, a dimorphic fungus occurring in a yeast form in infected tissues or in a hyphal form in the environment.

More than one-third of the population is believed to have been wiped out in the north of the island state, and there are reports that the disease has now spread to southern areas. It is almost always fatal, causing ulcers that turn into gaping wounds.

The shy solitary platypus inhabits the waterways of Tasmania and the eastern Australian mainland. The same fungus is found on the mainland, where it kills amphibians, particularly Queensland’s green tree frogs, but does not affect platypuses there.

Niall Stewart, a research fellow at the Univ. of Tasmania, believes that the tiny frogs may have carried the fungus into Tasmania in bunches of Queensland bananas. “Platypuses on the mainland have evolved with the fungus, and so they’re immune,” he said. “But the poor platypuses here haven’t seen it before.” The island is a haven for platypuses, thanks to its abundant waterways. But Dr. Stewart, who has carried out extensive field work, believes that 35 percent are falling victim to the disease in the affected areas.

Dr. Stewart said nothing was being done to combat the disease. He has repeatedly failed to secure research funding. The problem has been overshadowed by a rare cancer that has killed half of the wild population of another native animal, the Tasmanian devil, and threatens that species’ survival.

The ulcers, which appear on a platypus’s broad tail or hips, grow to up to 10 cm in diameter. Death is usually caused by secondary bacterial infections or from depletion of body fat, most of which is stored in the tail. The wounds also prevent the platypus from keeping warm in cold water.

It is not known how the disease is transmitted—possibly by ticks, or by males fighting, or via burrows. Dr. Stewart said it was feasible that mud containing fungal spores was being carried into new areas on hikers’ boots or 4x4 vehicles.

Asked if the Tasmanian platypus could develop immunity, he replied: “Possibly, in a few hundred thousand years. The problem is that mature animals with ulcers are still capable of breeding, so they’re producing more susceptible animals. It would take a long time for natural selection to sort it out.” The platypus is one of only three monotremes—egg-laying mammals—in the world. The others are Australia’s two species of echidna, or spiny anteater.

Reprinted from the Feb., 2007 issue of The Spore Print, L. A. Mycological Society.

Time to Renew

OMS Dues are Due for 2007

A new year is upon us, and this means your OMS membership is up for renewal. OMS dues are still only $10 per year, or $125 for a lifetime membership. The cutoff date for dues payment is March 31, 2007. You will be removed from the OMS Mushroom Log mailing list after the March/April issue, if we haven’t received dues from you before the subsequent issue is to be mailed. Use the handy renewal form provided in this Log. And please, alert us of any name, address, zip code, email, and telephone number or area code changes.

NAMA dues are also due now. NAMA dues for OMS members are $32. To qualify for this rate, a separate check must be made out to NAMA and sent to OMS (Dick Doyle) not to NAMA. If you send it to NAMA, they will send it back to us for verification since you must be an OMS member before you can join NAMA at this discounted rate.

This would be a great year to join NAMA, as their national foray is in nearby Pipestem, WV (in Summers Co. in the southeastern part of WV) on Aug. 16-19! If you’ve never attended a national foray many of us can tell you it’s a great experience. There will be numerous opportunities to meet fellow mushroomers from all over the country. They also have a varied program of talks, workshops, and social events all of which makes this a very worthwhile event to attend. Campsites are available at Pipestem for the foray weekend. For more information call Pipestem Park at 304/466-1800 or 800/225-5982. Outside the park there are cabins for rent in Bluestone and there’s a new Holiday Inn located in Princeton.

To sum up:

· OMS costs $10 per year

· NAMA costs $32 per year —for OMS members

· Separate checks, please

· Send checks together to Dick Doyle

We welcome your ongoing participation!

Articles for the next newsletter

Deadline –May. 26

David Miller

352 W. College St.

Oberlin, OH 44074

David.H.Miller@oberlin.edu

Mea Culpa, Mea Maxima Culpa!

While preparing this issue of the Log, I went back amongst the previous Logs I’ve edited to determine the two in which I’d reprinted Dan Winkler’s articles on Cordyceps. Guess what I discovered in the May/June, 2006 issue of the Log, but the very same article on Morels and How to Find Them by Tim Geho that somehow mysteriously also found its way into the Jan./Feb. 2007 issue. With all the excitement of the upcoming morel season, I’d completely forgotten I’d already published his article nearly a year earlier! I could say I decided that it was such a good informative piece (which it is!) that it deserves another viewing, but the truth is that somehow I simply forgot that I had used it earlier.

And everyone has been so kind as to not point out the error of my ways to me. Or maybe no one else noticed either! Which reminds me that when I wrote Harley Barnhart for permission to use his book review of Orson & Hope Miller’s Field Guide, in addition to his assent, he commented “It’s nice to know that someone actually reads this stuff…” So I’m not sure whether to feel relieved that there hasn’t been a chorus of complaints about the repetition or feel neglected that no one pays that much attention to the Log to even notice. Or maybe your memories are as shot as mine.

You’ve probably noticed I’ve tucked this “correction” down at the most obscure bottom part of the Log, just the way even the most prestigious periodicals do with theirs.

Calendar of Events

OMS Events

Email Jerry at g_pepera@sbcglobal.net to receive notification of impromptu events. Check your most recent issue of the Mushroom Log for event updates and for more detailed information. Please plan to join us.

April 21st (Sat.)--morel miniforay at Salt Fork State Park at Cambridge OH (eastern OH near the junction of I-77 and I-70). Convene at 9:00 at State Park Office parking lot. Hunt departs promptly at 9:30 am. Sharon Greenberg hosts. (330) 457-2345.

April 28th (Sat.)—morel miniforay at Denison Biological Reserve. Convene at 9:00 at the Bio Reserve on Rt. 661 just north of the Denison campus. Dick Doyle (740) 587-0019.

May 6^th (Sun.) Morel miniforay at Woodbury Wildlife Area. Dick Grimm, host. (740) 694-0782.

May 6th (Sun. late (11) am, due to turkey hunting. Morel miniforay at Salt Fork State Park. Same meeting info as April 21^st above. Walt (330) 426-9833.

May 12^th(Sat, 9am)—Morel Hunt at Mt. Gilead State Park

Directions: From I-71 take exit 151 onto OH-95 toward Mt, Gilead. Drive 6.5 mi west to Mt. Gilead S.P. We will meet at the last parking lot to the left of the park office. We will eat lunch in Mt. Gilead, and if anyone wants to do more hunting, we may explore Alum Creek State Park in the afternoon.

Contact Hugh Urban for more info: (614) 447-0706 or urban..41@osu.edu (Hugh Urban, host)

May 17-19^th—Thur & Fri 7-9 pm Sat 10-noon, Foray. All at Rocky River Nature Center, North Olmsted. For any (adults only) who want a good basic knowledge of mushrooms. For registration (begins May 1), call

Debra Shankland at (440) 734-6660. A writeup will appear in the May issue of Cleveland Metroparks Emerald Necklace.

Other impromptu mini forays, as follows:

An open invitation to anyone who wants to mushroom hunt in Fredericktown. Call Dick Grimm (740) 694-0782, and if he’s available and there are mushrooms in the woods, he will go.

July Ohio Wesleyan-Dick Grimm with Nancy Murray.

Aug. 25—Christmas Rocks State Nature Preserve—Lancaster OH. Shirley McClelland with Dick Grimm

Oct. Sand Barrens-North Kingsville, Pete & Pauline Munk.

Email Jerry as instructed above.

July 27-29—Summer Foray at Carlisle Reservation, Lorain County Metroparks, near Oberlin.

Sept. 29-30. Fall Foray, Deep Woods, Hocking Co. (440) 236-9222.

Sat. Nov.10^th. Annual Dick Grimm Banquet. Details tba.

Ohio & Regional

April 28-29 — Western PA Mushroom Club’s (WPMC)

Morel Madness, Mingo Creek. see website at

www.wpamushroomclub.org

Bio-Blitz: Sat June 2^nd, 5^th Annual bioblitz for Geauga Park District, Bass Lake Preserve.

July 7 or 14^th. Bio-Blitz at Deep Woods, Hocking Co.

Sept. 7-9^th. Terra Alta Mountain Mushroom Weekend. $95 non-members, $80 members. Walt Sturgeon’s workshop. For more info call Greg Park at 304/242-6855.