Occasionally, we'll see mushrooms fruiting in our LAGG Teaching Garden. It's always a pleasure! Some are even edible - if we find them in time. One never knows if or when they'll appear. They're not harming anything. Just minding their business, earning their living by decomposing organic material - of which we have plenty in the teaching garden, since we keep the paths and planted beds mulched, to conserve and preserve water, keep down weeds, and feed the soil and our plants as it breaks down.

This morel above came up just behind the compost bin and in with the peas. If we'd found it earlier (and fresher), would have been very tasty.

This photo was from my home garden, but I did find one in the LAGG garden that was a bit over the hill. It's a decomposer, so it likely arrived on the woody mulch. I wish we could cultivate it - it's a good mushroom - the one you get at the grocery store.

Psathyrella: here is another common, safe mushroom that grows on woody mulch.

POISONOUS

The Chlorophyllum molybdites is one that can show up in gardens (see Natural History Museum's garden bed, when I taught a couple of years ago), lovely to look at, but has green spores (on gills), and poisonous if you eat it.

Someday, we might do a mushroom growing project in one of our beds. How does that sound?

- Florence, LAGG Founder, Master Gardener, Teacher and Mycologist