The Long and Winding Road from California to Washington: We Pause for Marilyn's Mushrooms

November 2021

    I know nothing about them, other than to enjoy eating them, but mushrooms fascinate me, and I love taking pictures of them. 

    I've always used "champignon" for mushroom in French, derived from Latin, and used with slight variation in numerous other languages. 

    The first mushrooms I saw on our trip were on the fence along the path to the Octopus Tree up the hill from Cape Meares Lighthouse on the Oregon coast.

Cool ruffles and black markings.

Back of above mushroom and, to left, where the stem had been.

Opening toadstool providing a bugbath?

A more orangeish version.

Mushroom Dance: Some are more flamboyant than others.

Drooping mushroom, exhausted from the dance.

    Scientifically, a toadstool is the same as a mushroom. The word seems to have come into use around the 16th century, meaning literally a stool for a toad, as heard in folk and fairy tales.

And who shelters under this lovely toadstool?

    

    I was on hold on the phone in a soft rain in the parking lot at Harris Beach State Park in Brookings, Oregon, when I started to notice the mushrooms around the tree. I had plenty of time to get in under the branches to take pictures. They weren't as colorful as those by the Octopus Tree, but interesting nonetheless.

    "Mushroom" may be derived from another Old French word, "mousseron," meaning "moss," perhaps referring to mushrooms that grow in moss. Mousserons can mean a fairy ring (a circle of mushrooms growing in grass), meadow mushrooms, or St George's mushroom. The latter refers to the fact that this type of mushroom typically appears in Britain and Ireland by April 23, St. George's Day.

    An emerging mushroom reminded me of Kleanza Creek Provincial Park in British Columbia, where we could practically see the mushrooms grow. We would spot them barely emerging. Then when we returned a couple of hours later, they'd be fully above ground. And later, they were even taller and bigger. It was the most amazing thing!

Emerging mushroom.

Such gills and ruffles!

    My third mushroom spotting was on the stump of a tree at our campsite at Emerald Forest in Trinidad, California. It was my reward for the very tight campsite and all the rain and mud.

The large horizontal mushrooms tiered down the tree stump, brown and sometimes slimy on top, white on the edges and underside.

Like plates with wavy and ruffled edges.

Underside.

Toadstools found a home with shelter.

Mushrooms on mushrooms.

    It took me quite a while to get the last picture and it still didn't come out completely in focus. I was entranced by the mushroom standing alone among the ferns on its slender black stem with white pointed cap. 

    Et voilà. Probably a good time to stop with etymology, and I won't go into edible versus inedible, as it quickly gets confusing.