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Mushroom Hunters Prepare for Fungus Fair

Ken Sommers hunts for mushrooms.
Ken Sommers hunts for mushrooms.

By Krista Almanzan

http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/kazu/local-kazu-665858.mp3

Santa Cruz – Area mushroom hunters spent the week before the fungus fair collecting fresh specimens to display. Fungus Federation Member Ken Sommers and a few other hunters searched Santa Cruz's Scwhan Lake Park early Tuesday morning.
Sommers said there are two kinds of mushroom hunters, "there are those who join the club to find tasty treats in order to provide themselves a wonderful food dish in the evening and then there are those who are into it for scientific reasons, education, the joy of finding things they haven't seen before." Sommers is the first kind. For each edible mushroom he found on Tuesday, he had a culinary story. He raved about the Candy Cap mushroom cheesecake he has tried and the colorful Bluet mushroom rice dish he once made. But he knows a gourmet mushroom hunter can't survive on gourmet mushroom knowledge alone. He also has to be a bit of scientific mushroom hunter because the knowledge can be a life saver. There are thousands of different wild mushrooms, many of which can make you sick and some that are even deadly. "Every year we're called in over cases of mushroom poisoning and that touches all our hearts because nobody needs to go through that. A mushroom poisoning case can be very severe and does a lot of damage to the body, it's really rough. And presently if it's a real severe case the only way to save a person's life is by giving a liver transplant which is real heavy duty surgery," said Sommers.
You can see what these mushroom hunters found, taste mushroom dishes and learn about identifying wild mushrooms at the fungus fair. The fair is on Saturday, January 12th and Sunday, January 13th from 10am to 5pm at the Louden Nelson Community Center in Santa Cruz. Admission is $6 for adults and free for kids under 12.