Well it is that time of year again and I headed south to see my buddy to look for mushrooms. I went last weekend and we only found about 22. I was hoping this weekend would be better.
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| Loaded up for morel hunting |
This time the entire family went with me. The kids played in the town park while me and my buddy Spanky went hunting. We found a nice batch in the morning for lunch. We took them back to the park and my wife cooked everyone lunch.
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| The kids counting the mushrooms we found in the morning. |
After lunch we looked all afternoon. The small square pictured below on the left is what we found from 1 pm till 5 pm. We wanted to eat supper together before we headed back home so we went to my buddy favorite spot to check to see if there was anything there. Due to the limited amount of time we went straight to the spot we like to call the "Honey Hole". We usually find our highest numbers in this area and if there wasn't anything there we knew there were none to be found elsewhere in the area. We were not to be disappointed. After spotting the first three we all looked up and all we could see was mushrooms everywhere. It took 45 minutes to pick them all. It was awesome!!! In 45 minutes we picked 322 mushrooms. That is more than we have found collectively the last 4 years I have gone down total. We found a whopping 385 on the day. Definitely was a fun fun day!
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| 385 morels in one day this year. |
Tonight I went out with my son to check the cows and make sure everyone was doing well. We had some nice soaking rain this morning that was followed by some very warm and sunny weather today so I asked Alex if he wanted to check for some mushrooms. We started with the spot where I used to always find them first. Last year we only found one there and this year I have seen nothing. Well, I learned my lesson last year and I have several spots I check each time I go out. I was just telling Alex that we might as well head in to eat supper when something caught the corner of my eye. I spun around and said "Alex, we got one!" he turned around and spotted it pretty quickly and then he started spotting all of it's buddies.
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| Alex pointing to his first morel of the year here in Columbiana Ohio. |
I have always wanted to catch them early once to check their growth out to see if they truly just pop and they are done or if they grow for a while first. So we checked all the ones we found and picked a few of them for frying up for supper and left the rest go and I marked a small one with my pen and took a picture to compare each day for a few days till it starts to get old to see how it grows.
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| Morel Growth Study 2014, Day 1 |
Here are the few that we picked. It frosted pretty decent on Sunday night and I checked the area Saturday and there was nothing so I am certain that between the cold and the lack of recent rain that these little fellas popped up in the last 24-48 hours.
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| The first morels we picked on the farm this year. |
Here is a picture with my safety glasses for size reference. Again, not the biggest I have had here but for the first ones these are nice. I would take a woods full of these any day of the week!
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| Morel size reference first crop 2014 |
I wanted to post a few pics of the cows enjoying the pasture the other day. They were relaxing in the early morning and so I had some time to get a few pictures and check them all out.
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| Here is Black Eye on the left and Candy apple on the right with her baby in the middle. |
It was early Saturday morning and as the little ones were getting up it was obviously breakfast and me being there was not going to stop that.
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| Here is Socks (Charolais x Angus sire, Shorthorn Dam) getting breakfast from his momma Sally |
I switch them all over to the big pasture on Monday Tuesday night because the small one was quickly getting eaten down and I want to spread it out so the grass stays ahead of the cows. I hope the warm weather coming up speeds up the growth of the pastures, this cold is making for a very late spring.
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| The cows out for the first time this year on the big pasture. |
I promise to be checking the woods everyday here for a while to check the growth of the mushrooms. If I find any smaller ones I will be sure to mark them so I can check the growth rate and post it. As I try to learn more about them I find it increasingly difficult as most website want to charge you to share any information other than spotting reports. I will share everything I know as the season progresses, other than the locations of where I pick, so that more people can learn and understand about the Morels some of us love so dearly.
Have a great night everyone and happy hunting to all my fellow Mushroomers!
Kenny
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