Quiz: Are These Mushrooms Choice, Edible or Inedible/Poisonous?

47 Comments

1. great

2. I never am able to tell fairy ring, stumpers and honey from pholiota. Puffballs are good, I take exception with choice, but, lycoperdon is terribly amusing! Coprinus is much fun too.
   How are you with medicinal plants?
   Perhaps you can illuminate my experimentation with ghost plant? Pic in previous post.
   Grin, nuts, fish, birds, deer, elk, fungus, berries, leaves, bark. All excuses, (for me), to wander the woods, aimlessly, for days, weeks, well really, years…

   • I’m an herbalist, outdoorsman, fisherman, camper, hunter, etc, so I spend as much time as possible out in the forest, too. Yes, I know a bit about wild plants; not just medicinal ones but also edible ones.

     “Choice” is subjective, but I used the term to mean what the majority of foragers consider to be choice. I disagree with several. I do love giant puffball steaks, though. :))

   • By ghost plant, do you mean Monotropa uniflora?

     • Exactly! I have seen them when gathering Chanterelles. Finally started to study them, two years later, conducted the test I posted. Then tried a tea, (the initial taste was a research ender), that worked quite well for me. A few brave souls asked to try it with results above my expectations but, I’m concerned of placebo effect and cannot seem to find more than cursory research…Sigh.

       • To my knowledge, there hasn’t been a great deal of research done about it. That isn’t particularly unusual, though. Many plants that have been used medicinally since Greek and Roman times still haven’t had more than cursory research done on them. A large number that are routinely used in Europe and can be purchased in drug stores can’t be sold in the US as medicinal, despite solid proof that they work. The FDA won’t allow them to carry “medicinal” in the description. They have to say “herbal supplement”.

         1

         • The Native Americans have been using this plant for many hundreds of years, though.

3. Only got half right. Thought I’d do much better. I used to go mushroom hunting with my parents a lot when I was younger.

   • You did quite well! I love foraging. I would have been out looking for shaggy manes if the forest fires all over the place hadn’t closed the forests.

4. 2/10 so don’t take me with you to hunt mushrooms

   • Actually, I’d enjoy taking you mushroom foraging. It would be a chance of showing you what can and what cannot be eaten.

     • That would be fine, but what I meant was don’t depend on me to find the right ones or you could end up sick or dead

       Wasn’t that how Siddhartha Gautama died?

       • I don’t know who that was, so I can’t answer the question. There aren’t many deadly mushrooms, though. The deadly mushrooms can definitely kill in small quantities, usually from liver failure and/or heart related problems. Some poison mushrooms can be deadly, but only if too many are eaten. Most poison mushrooms don’t kill, they just make a person very painfully sick.

         Still, of the many thousands of kinds of mushrooms, over 70% are neither poisonous nor deadly. Most of those aren’t worth eating, but they won’t kill you if you do.

         • You don’t know Siddhartha Gautama? Better known to his followers as the Buddha…

         • Oh. I thought the name was familiar, but I couldn’t place it.

5. Thank you!

6. Fun Rex, need to be careful cause I only got 3 right and that would be a bit risky for me mushrooms picking.

   • Care should always be taken, but a score of three really isn’t too bad. This isn’t an easy quiz.

7. 4 out of 10… welp.

   • That is really pretty good. Good job!

8. I knew less about mushrooms. Just 3 correct answers.

   • That is the great thing about quizzes, Cassy, they afford you to learn something new. Learning new things is always a good thing.

   • Incidentally, a score of 3 isn’t bad. This isn’t an easy quiz, particularly for anyone who has never foraged for mushrooms. :))

9. what does choice mean, they are the ones that I got wrong

   • Brenda, please see my response to @ninaartist. A choice mushroom is one that the majority of expert mushroom foragers feel is superior in taste. I don’t always agree, but the term is used as a consensus of the best-tasting mushrooms.

     Sometimes, on the other hand, I definitely agree with that consensus. For example, the last mushroom in the quiz is Agaricus bisporus. It is edible, but very few foragers consider it to be choice. When this mushroom is wild, it is most often known as a field mushroom or meadow mushroom. Most people know the mushroom as a button mushroom, white mushroom, crimini mushroom, or portobello mushroom. It is the most commonly sold mushroom in the world, but it isn’t choice.

     • Thank-you, Rex. I thought I knew a lot about mushrooms until I took this quiz.

       • You can think of it this way, Brenda; if you didn’t know what choice was and marked the choice mushrooms as “edible”, you were still right. The choice mushrooms CAN be eaten and they simply happen to be excellent in flavor.

10. What does “choice” mean as an answer?

    • A choice mushroom is a mushroom that the majority of expert foragers think are superior in taste. I don’t always agree with the experts, and it is a subjective term, but to be choice (at least in this quiz), most expert foragers must agree that the mushroom is excellent to eat.

      • Oh. I had no idea that this was the meaning of “choice.”
        I was clueless abut this meaning.
        Thank you.

        • As I said to Brenda, if you didn’t know what choice was, and marked the choice ones as “edible”, you were still right.

11. 5/10

    • That is a good score, Samantha!

12. 5 correct, the only ones i will harvest is the morale.

    • You did quite well. I harvest all of the choice mushrooms listed here, as well as some that aren’t considered choice, but which I personally like. :))

13. 3/10 I think I should stay away from forest with mushrooms 😀

    • That really isn’t a bad score. There are thousands of different kinds of mushrooms. This quiz only lists 10 of them.

14. got 6 out of 10 right!

    • That is extremely good!

15. I got 4 out of 10 right!

    • That is really pretty good! It is surprising, too, that most mushrooms are found around the globe.

      • Yeah… I think this is indeed very challenging, Rex!

        • It is worthwhile to learn to identify at least some of the most common wild mushrooms, though.

16. 2 of 10 – Needless to say I do not forage for mushrooms and that is probably a good thing.

    • This is something that can be learned, though. I used to love foraging; walking miles for a few pounds of mushrooms. I can’t walk that far anymore, but it was enjoyable and was a great time with the family.

17. 6/10 – that was very interesting. I’ve always been interested in doing some sort of foraging workshop so I can learn a bit more about what’s edible and what’s not in the wild

    • Some mushrooms are easy to identify, as there are no other mushrooms that are truly similar. (For instance, even false morels don’t look much like morels…both are in the quiz.) The problem is that there are some edible ones that look very similar to inedible or poisonous ones and to really learn to distinguish, a person needs to go foraging with someone who can identify the mushrooms. Actually seeing them is the best way to learn.