The One Exception

As mentioned in the previous blog, Sela and Eli happened to time their visit during one of the coldest April's I have ever spent here at the pond.  As a result, we spent most of their visit inside with one exception.  The one exception was mushroom hunting.

Their first experience was on Thursday when Laura tricked Sela and Eli into walking the dogs through the timber.  That's the reason they thought they were going but the Queen of Fun (otherwise known as Laura) decided to sneak in some mushroom hunting.  She managed to get lost so my niece and nephews' first mushroom hunting experience will probably always remain their most memorable.

The next day, Mike arranged for his brother Bill, mushroom hunter extraordinaire, to lead our group.  Bill arrived in the warm, enclosed and heated Polaris and drove us and the dogs around to his and his mother's favorite 'honey holes'.  Honey holes are where morel mushrooms have been spotted in previous years.  This does not mean there will be any mushrooms found there in future years but it is a place to start.  Then he taught us how to look for new 'honey holes'.  Morel mushrooms are usually found around dead or dying sycamore trees.  He showed us sycamore trees and said dying trees often had the bark falling off of them.

Once our education was complete, Bill parked the Polaris, gave each hunter their own walking stick and led the hunt.  They were quite an impressive sight with the dogs trailing behind them.  I stayed behind and took pictures.  Unfortunately, no morel mushrooms were found.  It is just too cold yet (the nights are still below freezing) for the mushrooms or much of anything else to be out.

It was really too bad that Sela and Eli could not find any mushrooms.  Still they did go mushroom hunting.  I am pretty sure that if they have to write a report entitled 'What I did on my Spring Break' that no other students will reference mushroom hunting.  It will probably be the first time the teacher has ever read such a report.  I am sure she will appreciate the novelty.