Which one is a mushroom?

These ones are. . .

and these ones aren't.

I have had lots of people making comments about us eating field mushrooms. They seem to think we will either kill ourselves or wake up naked on the lawn (though this doesn't sound all bad).

So this is how you can tell a mushroom from the others:

• It smells like a mushroom
• When new it can be white on top with pale mushroom pink gills
• Older mushrooms are usually brown on top and the gills are darker...often almost black.
• The stalk is thick.
• The cap is connected to the stalk or there is a frill where the cap has pulled away.
• The skin easily peels from the cap.

There is one other fungus that fulfills all of these criteria and usually grows beneath oak trees...IT IS poisonous and so the final test is:

• If a yellow mark develops when you scratch the mushroom with your nail...DON'T eat it.

Have fun mushrooming!

Oh, and the final test is how you find yourself after eating the mushies...if you become sick, die, or wake up naked on the lawn, you probably got it wrong.