Hot on the Trail of the Edible Fungi in Illinois
October 11, 2008
In the Midwest, morel mushrooms, a meaty sprout with a distinct honeycombed cap, are king. 
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In the Midwest, morel mushrooms, a meaty sprout with a distinct honeycombed cap, are king. Spring Landscaping, Greenery, & Plantings
May 25, 2008
This being a long Memorial Day Holiday weekend, I decided to start a large, important landscape project t. I have realized that my morel mushroom habitat won’t come to life this year - we would have seen morels sticking their heads up by now. I rented a behemoth of a tiller from Hertz rentals up the street and after wrestling with that monster, my efforts have rewarded me with lovely tilled earth. Now the hard part - what to decide to plant and where.
All of the following pictures are clickable, which will enlarge them.
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This first picture shows my favorite new spot of our backyard, in the corner, along the fence. It gets a good amount of sunshine, but along the fence it’s shaded, thanks to the elm trees in the neighbor’s yard behind the fence. I know I want at least one rhodie here, and I picked out a daisy bush (pictured, small yellow flowers) that will grow to 6′ around hopefully. There are also two flaming bushes that in the fall turn a lovely red color. Now, though, they’re a nice light green, just beyond the rhodie. |
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Here’s a different view of the same area. I’m thinking I might just get some emerald green arborvitaes, the coniferous evergreen bushes that grow vertically… not very imaginative on my part. Could also do some photinias. |
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This is how you see our front yard as you approach the walk. My wife wants to plant a new rhodie to the left of the lawn, you see it in its container on the left. Farther back, near the fenceline, is my concern. It needs some color, some lightening, some pizaz. We’ve decided to put in a lovely double peony plant, then another daisy bush, and finally a rose bush, in that order, left to right. |
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here’s another perspective of the rockery garden in front. |
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and this last picture shows the two lovely large rhodies that grow right in front of the house… with a very ugly open hole. This gets minimal direct sun. Another rhodie…? |
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Backyard Cleanup, Before & After Jimenez Tree Service
May 12, 2008
This is slightly off topic, but since it is gardening related, I thought I’d post. Besides, I’m very happy with the results. Jacobo Jimenez of Jimenez Tree Service does great work. In February, he and another fellow did a fantastic job reclaiming our front slope which was totally overtaken by blackberries. He removed them, laid down mulch, and planted 30 purple flowering Vincas.
Front Slope, Before: 
Front Slope, After: 
When it came time to clean up our horrible, ugly fenceline on the north side of our yard, I called Jacobo and got a quote. Here’s the before and after series.
1) Before: 
1) After:
2) Before:
2) After:
3) Before:
3) After: 
4) Before: 
4) After: 
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Keep Your Morels Moist!
May 8, 2008
If you’re attempting to grow a morel mushroom habitat from a spore kit like I am, read and follow the directions. We’ve not had rain in a number of days here in the Puget Sound area, and my morel bed was looking a little dry, so I dowsed it today by hand using a sprinkler.
By the way, did anyone catch the morel mushroom episode on “Cash & Treasures” show on Discover Network channel? The 30 minute show followed the host being led through the forests of Michigan, hunting for wild morels. Apparently, they can fetch upwards of $80 a pound…? On eBay, the going rate currently is about $20 to $30 a pound.
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Assistant Groundskeeper Earns His Keep
May 7, 2008
I’m so proud of my little boy Zuzu… look at what he brought home to us:
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MyMorels.com Morel Mushroom Habitats Spring 08 Update Video
May 5, 2008
This video is from footage shot late April, 2008. This shows the current condition of the two morel mushroom bed habitats.
Note that I installed (low gauge) chicken wire on top of the more susbtantial fence walls of the first morel bed - this was done to prevent crap from falling in to the morel bed. Since the transient neighborhood house has a commanding view of the bed and also since they are young and partake of the spirits now and again and behave erratically at times, to assuage my paranoia I covered them to prevent thrown deleterious material from entering my bed. Am I now a grumpy old man?
The morel bed was established using spore kits from two different suppliers (and are of two different species of morchella). The habitat has only been in existence since October of last year, so there won’t be a plethora of morel mushrooms - I’m told that this first spring season may come and go with nary one delectible morel sprout. In the spirit of Cinco de Mayo, que será será.
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Big Thanks to The Great Morel!
May 5, 2008
My little blog, MyMorels.com, has received a big boost recently. I’ve had an email conversation with the Administrator, THE Great Morel himself over at The Great Morel. He was glad to see the documentation and recording of mymorels.com morel mushroom cultivation project. Since he’s put up links and a site review of MyMorels.com from their Growing Tips page, we’re receiving an explosion of traffic.
The Great Morel has stories, pictures, recipes, FAQs, and a message board. They’re geared towards morel mushroom hunting but there is a good section on cultivating your own morels. They’re a treasure trove of morel mushroom information.
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Time Lapse Photography of Morels Growing, Day One
April 29, 2008
Today, April 29th 2008, I took my first photo of my morel mushroom habitat. This will be the first photo in a series to document the growth of my morel mushrooms. I will take one photo per day taken from the exact same perspective on a camera tripod. In a month from now, I’ll produce a ‘video’ of the still photographs in series to document and show morel growth.
In case you’re interested, here’s the first photo. No need to strain your pupils, there aren’t any visible signs of morels yet:
Posted in The Sowing Phase 2 Comments »
Morel Mushroom Bed Site Prep: New Video!
April 26, 2008
This video is from October 2007 footage. The only tools required for this part of the morel mushroom bed construction are: shovel, edger, and tape measure.
According to the morel mushroom spore kit instructions, there’s enough spores within the kit to cover a 4′ by 4′ area. But locating a good site on your property for the habitat is first. The morel mushroom bed habitat must be:
- Shady
- Well drained soil
- in contact with the ground soil (for the mycelium to ‘root’ and grow)
(The bed must also be protected from hungry morel-eating critters. The protective fencing video comes later.)
Please Note: I mistakenly say in the narrative that the bed should be located in not shady areas. This is wrong.The morel mushroom habitat bed must be in shady conditions, at most part sunny only. I’m new to the video creation thing… My next video, fence construction, will be much better!
In the meantime, if you’ve got a hankering for morel mushrooms right now (you can get fresh morels or dried morels (and any other type of mushroom you like), check out these sellers delectibles:
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Video: Morel Spore Kit & Soil Mixing
April 25, 2008
This is video from October 2007. I prepared the soil base according to the morel mushroom spore kit instructions. The ingredients include:
- 1-2 Gallons wood ash & burnt wood chunks
- 1-2 Gallons Peat Moss
- 1-2 Gallons Topsoil
- 1 gallon sand
- 1 gallon approx gypsum wallboard, crushed
- Morel Spore Kit
(These may not be the exact specifications of the mixture; they were called out in the morel mushroom spore kit instructions - they seem to have disappeared.)
These ingredients are for the Morchella angusticeps (or ‘fire morel’ mushrooms.) The spore kit was from Fungi Perfecti. The company is in Olympia, Washington. Important disclaimer: whether or not the spores actually fruit is not guaranteed. FP provides a healthy morel mushroom spore kit; it is up to the grower (me and you) to create a well-prepared morel mushroom bed ‘habitat.’ With a little cooperation from The Elements, morel mushrooms will hopefully begin to appear within one to two springs of planting.
Creating the morel soil mixture was actually the easiest part of the process in crating a morel mushroom bed. The site clean up and preparation was by far the most labor intensive. Oy, my back! Also, creation of anti-critter fencing was more work than the soil mixture creation.
I had a fun time compiling this video and editing it; if you’re interested, I used my ‘old’ Hi-8 Sony camcorder to film, and I used Pinnacle Studio 10 to capture and edit the raw footage. There’s actually about an hour’s worth of raw footage of the entire process; this 5 minute clip is one of three videos I plan on releasing.
Thank you!
Don, the urban morel farmer
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