We're going on a bear - oops fungi - hunt!

On September 7th 2025, Liz Holden led some keen Inverness Botany Group members on a Fungi Foray in Newtonmore.   In spite of a forecast for rain, it stayed dry while we walked around Loch Imrich and the adjoining Folk Park (finishing up at the cafe and picnic site for lunch).  Liz was a mine of interesting information about the fungi we found and their interactions with the tree roots. The familiar toadstools or mushrooms are just the fruiting bodies of the underground network of hyphae called mycelium (fungal threads) that are underground. 

 The first stop was at a dead Larch trunk which sported some very large Dyer's Mazegill (Phaeolous schweinitzii) and lots of Sulphurtuft (Hypholoma fasciculare).  When a UV torch was produced, the Sulphurtuft glowed eerily!

Most of what we found was not safe for eating with the exception of a very big Cauliflower fungus (Sparassis crispa). It is delicious if found when it is white rather than the brown state of the one we found at the base of a Larch, but was definitely the biggest fungus we found being at least 30cm across.

Liz next to the Cauliflower Fungus

Liz explained about the different kinds of veils or protective coatings that protect the developing mushroom and which leave a trace on the mature mushroom.  The universal veil is an a bit like a soft egg shell and the mushroom develops inside and then bursts through as it grows.  An example from my garden is Orange Grisette (Amanita crocea) which emerges from a white "egg".

Orange Grisette from birth to mushroom

In some fungi, like the Fly Agaric, the remains of the veil stick to the cap in shreds until they are washed off by the rain. 

As well as fungi, we walked past a large area of Dwarf Elder (Sambucus ebulus) which flowers much  later than the familiar Elderberry (Sambucus nigra) and does not become woody.  The scent of the flowers could be smelt from a distance.  We were not the only ones to notice it as this male white tailed bumblebee was enjoying a feed.

Dwarf Elder is not common in Scotland as the distribution map below shows:

In Inverness-shire, most of the records are along the Spey valley and there is a large population at Ruthven Barracks, Kingussie.

If you are interested in learning more about fungi, here are two books I own that I found interesting:

Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake

and

 Fascinated by Fungi by Pat O'Reilly

Entangled Life is more of a scientific account of fungi and the current research and uses, especially of the mycelium (the underground network of fungus that can produce mushrooms) though it makes more interesting reading than that sounds!  Fascinated by Fungi has lots of photos of different fungi and interesting facts about them.