Here are a few fungi finds from Snake Road in Southern Illinois for this #fungifriday
While we were looking for snakes I had my eye on the fungi. I first found some chicken of the woods.
Sadly it was a bit old at this point so we didn't bother harvesting any as it would be too tough and woody to eat. Also I didn't want to have a copperhead strike my hand while picking this thing lol.
There were huge wood ear mushrooms growing as well. This is one of the largest wood ear batch I've ever seen.
There were around the diameter of a softball. Again I didn't harvest it because it would be terrible to suddenly uncover a cottonmouth snake while picking this thing lol.
I found some crepidotus mushrooms under a paw paw tree leaf. Sadly it wasn't paw paw season but now I know its a great place to forage for them.
These are often called mock oysters since they kind of resemble white summer oyster mushrooms. But they are slightly toxic and quite a bit smaller than oysters to it is easy to avoid accidentally harvesting them.
Mushroom hunting on snake road is a bit of an adrenaline rush. I heard a rustling as I crept in here for a shot. It was probably a green snake or a lizard but still it could have been a timber rattler.
Here is an unidentified little brown mushroom aka LBM. It kind of reminds me of a flower pot mushroom...
These were found near a swampy area full of water snakes. I actually had to take my shoes off and wade through the snakes to get across the flooded road lol. Fortunately no cottonmouths bit me.
Now for a large artist's conk. If you turn these over they are white underneath and you can scratch drawings in them or even wood burn designs in them.
Now for something that isn't a mushroom. Here's the real reason we went to snake road, for the snakes obviously lol. This is a cottonmouth warning us not to step on him. Thankfully these guys and rattle snakes warn you before biting unlike the copperheads that are around here. It seems snake road is great for fungi hunting but quite a bit of an adrenaline rush knowing these types of snakes might be next to the mushrooms lol.
I thought you lived up north? Do you have rattlesnakes so high up on the map? All the mushrooms say it's autumn now! Here in Sweden we have a snake called the Huggorm. It's a bit poisonous, like you can die from a bite because of the extremely sensitive underlying disease. It can be likened to a swarm of hornets.
We drove way south to the bottom of our state to snake road. Our cotton mouths look a lot like your death adders. I'm not sure if adders give you any warning before they bite? Thankfully there is only one here (the copperhead) that won't warn you, all the rest have an elaborate warning before they bite giving you enough time to step out of range.