What I Learned Hunting for Mushrooms

Before hiking the McKenzie River trail east of Eugene, Oregon, I would have sworn to you that I’d never eat a mushroom picked by my own hand. In many of life’s facets I am a do-it-myself-er. Painting and varnishing? Let me show you my twenty-five-year-old tool box filled with a curated selection of diligently maintained brushes for acrylic or oil-based finishes. Cooking from scratch? Child’s play. I mean that literally; it was a form of play for the kids in our family home. Growing heirloom tomatoes? Here’s my secret, cadged from cousin Kevin: add epsom salts to the hole before you plant and in a watering solution once a week during the growing season. Dog training? If you’ve got fur, four legs and a yearning for kibble, I’ll have you walking gently on a lead in a week. 

But mushroom forager? Nope, not me. I’ve heard too many gleefully alarming stories from friends about the time they spent a harrowing night in the throes of intestinal misery after mistaking a false morel for a perfectly edible (and super delish) true morel. The National Institutes of Health say there are nearly 7,500 reports of toxic mushroom exposure each year in the USA, 83% of which are “unintentional.” Three of those exposures are fatal. No thanks, I’ll keep my liver for other pursuits. (Also, am I the only one who thinks 17% of toxic mushroom exposure being “intentional” warrants more attention? Or at least provide more clickbait material? “Ten Ways to Tell if Your Teenager is Poisoning You”)

Our hike leader was a thirty-something-year-old high school chemistry teacher on sabbatical whose clothes on and off the trail were what you’d call “technical.” Designed for function over fashion (or flattery.) I recognized much of her attire—my own closet is filled with the same. To say Molly had an enthusiasm for chanterelle foraging is like me telling you I have a passing interest in lemon meringue pie. It’s common knowledge in certain circles that I have devoted the four decades since my grandmother passed away trying to find a lemon pie that rivals her recipe. Never pass up pie, that’s my motto. And that, my friends, is an enthusiast. What Molly felt for chanterelles was akin to fiery zealotry and like most zealots, she was eager to share her fanaticism, the Word According to Molly, with the four hikers following in her wake. We all believed we were there on the McKenzie river to hike miles of trail and soak up the cool green of old growth alder and conifer forest. A dedicated snacker, I anticipated almonds and chocolate at regular intervals and breaking into my lunch pack on the rocks above the turquoise water of Tamolich pool where the McKenzie river reemerges after flowing under a 1600-year-old lava flow for three miles.

Within ten minutes of shouldering my Osprey pack at the trailhead, I heard Molly shout something like, “Oh, NO!” or “Go BLOW!” I assumed first aid was necessary and as third in line behind her on the trail, I rushed past the others to see Molly, uninjured, flip open a knife she had tethered to her pack. Hunkering down, she gently cut a mushroom at the base of its stem and held it aloft like Michael Douglas held the gem in Romancing the Stone, which I guess made me Kathleen Turner only without a flashlight or an off-the-shoulder blouse and great boobs.

“Chanterelle,” Molly exhaled. “Forest gold.” Five pairs of eyes gazed at a mushroom. She may have said, Behold, acolytes! but probably I made that up after noting the fervor in her expression. 

Scanning the forest floor, Molly spotted another fungus lickety-split, cut the specimen from its stalk and held it on the flat of her extended left palm beside the previously harvested chanterelle in her right hand.

“Cool,” I said. “Two for the price of one, right?”

Wrong.

With a zippy, fifteen second tutorial, Molly taught us the difference between her forest gold chanterelle, with its uniform color of rich egg yolk, and the trickster fake, the false chanterelle: Hygrophoropsis aurantiaca. I squinted at the two mushrooms, unconvinced of my ability to discern any true difference and avoid post-dinner intestinal torment. Molly was undeterred by my lack of confidence. She popped the chanterelle into a mesh bag, tossed the fake fungus into the woods with an expert backhand and pointed up the trail. Onward!

Hiking directly behind our leader now, I watched her survey the undergrowth with a mushroom forager’s keen eye as we advanced. The next time Molly shouted back at her minions, I heard the call clearly: “Oh, HO!” Another true chanterelle. Over the next few hours, I would listen to Molly repeat “Oh, HO!” so often that I expected to look up and find her sporting an eyepatch and a curse-spitting parrot.

Molly’s fervor never abated and it passed on down the line of hikers, inspiring us all to seek out forest gold if only to hear “Oh, HO!” echo through the woods. I became obsessed with finding chanterelles that day. In years—miles—of hiking I had either ignored or was ignorant of their presence but now I scanned the ground in a sweep pattern designed not to miss a single chanterelle (or a dead body should there be one along the McKenzie river that morning.) 

Except when sprinting after Molly, who somehow managed to hunt mushrooms while hiking an Olympic race walker’s pace, I stopped looking up from the ground. I ceased to notice the sun climbing high into the midday sky, filtering light down through the Douglas firs of the Willamette National Forest. Crossing streams became a chore rather than a fun challenge to keep my socks dry. The two waist pockets of my pack were never unzipped; they stayed filled with roasted almonds and dark chocolate because for the love of all that’s holy, I stopped snacking. By the time our group arrived at the 37º water of Tamolich pool, I could only stare into the dream-worthy blue depths and think, “How did I get here?”

Hiking provides me with three perspectives as I negotiate any trail. One is inward: a running gag of self-directed inner dialogue about whether I can keep up with more experienced hikers, will I stop gasping for breath soon, can EVERYONE on this trail hear my heart pounding? How long it has been since my last snack break, and do these hiking trousers make my ass look huge?

The second perspective shows up when I stop focusing on myself and contemplate instead the natural world around me. The bottle brush twigs of that great conifer, the Douglas fir and how the bracts of its cones resemble tiny mouse butts. The way the light changes from gauzy slants in the morning to midday gold to cool hues in the late afternoon. There is an energy of any hiking group, there for each individual to absorb and put to use when our own energy flags. I know the privilege of having this place on tap, of living in a world that values the wilderness enough to keep it wild for me to experience. Not like an awful theme park pageant filled with crazy fake majesty—think smaller. Think infinitesimal. Like noticing the surface of a single leaf in a forest of leaves. Or the subtle, sweetish scent of Douglas fir needles when I crush them between my fingertips. I think large-scale, too. Like when I can vividly envision being the first human to step in these exact footsteps and picture the cultural procession of humans imagining the very same thing.

Finally my perspective shifts again, back to an inward view but by this time I am no longer complaining or anxious and I’m usually out of snacks. My breath comes slow and rhythmic and only I can hear it. My legs feel strong, my mind clears of all the monkey thoughts that normally race through it. Now is the time when creative ideas burble to the surface (and why I keep a notecard in my pack.) If I’m lucky I meditate as I walk with no stray thoughts at all.

Just before I signaled and turned the car down my street in Portland I spied a pickup truck parked across the way on Burnside piled high with a familiar egg yolk yellow cargo. Fresh chanterelles at five bucks per sack.

I lost all of that, those vital-to-me hiker’s perspectives, when Molly’s mushroom hunt became my hiking purpose. What did I gain? A bit of new knowledge but not enough to try chanterelle foraging on my own. My paltry pile of chanterelles? Enough to sauté in butter and garlic then toss with linguine to feed one single human.

I learned that even DIY-ers need to let other people do the job sometimes. The mushroom seller sitting in a lawn chair on the sidewalk on Burnside street was probably raising his kids on those five dollar sacks. Let him harvest mushrooms. And Molly*? Molly’s zest for discovering each mushroom made it clear that she lived, in part, for the thrill of a hunt lasting just a few weeks each year. Did I diminish her excitement by taking her calling as my own that day? Maybe not, but I learned that for me, a great hike isn’t a hunt, it’s just a walk in the woods at my own pace with my own thoughts. Plus snacks.

*Not her actual name. I focused so intently on the hunt that I don’t remember her real name.