He's very good at Latin names and reels them off easily- not so easy to remember as the common names. He also is a great advocate for not eating wild mushrooms, and has various horror stories of people who've died or been seriously poisoned when making picking errors, such as author Nicolas Evans, whose family suffered a mass fatal poisoning after eating deadly webcaps, mistaken for Chanterelles. I suspect he lays this on a bit thick, as he generally disapproves of picking wild mushrooms to eat, seeing this as a threat to their survival. This and habitat loss are the biggest threats he sees to fungi. He was somewhat dismissive of the mentality that the countryside is full of delicious free easy to identify mushrooms, and of certain day courses which charge £100+ for a days foraging, advertising that by the end of the day you'll be able to distinguish delicious edible species from others. Some edible species and dangerous ones are apparently very similar to all but expert eyes. Many people can also have violent allergic reactions to common 'edible' species, he once witnessed an accidental poisoning of a number of journalists who had a bad reaction to Chicken of the Woods. 3 Counties fungi, a local group Michael is an active member of, charge a token £3 for their foray trips.
http://www.3countiesgroup.abfg.org/index.html
Best thing to do to encourage fungi is deadwood and a biodiversity strategy. Another chap who was with us from the Blackdown Hills AONB group, Charles Hill, told us about the many amazing properties of Turkey Tail fungi; it has many health benefits and can be used for clearing toxins out of soil.
Our group got a bit demoralised as the heavens opened, and fungi pickings were generally thin, its a bit early in the season still after a dry autumn, but we did find about 15 species to show him, all of which he knew and enthused about. Perhaps the most interesting and spectacular and a new one to me was a vivid bright blue-green species, I'd never have believed such colours existed naturally in an English woodland, it seemed quite Alien. Chlorociboria aeruginascens is commonly known as Green Elf Cup, and goes right through the wood, staining it an exotic colour.
Overall, a soggy but informative couple of hours which encourages a closer look at these forgotten but essential woodland species; the 'recyclers' of the forest.
