Point Reyes National Park
wild mushroom foray 

Join our guided foray to learn where and when to look for wild mushrooms at Point Reyes National Seashore.  Your foray leader Ken Buegeleisen will meet everyone at the Bear Valley visitor center at 10am, and will guide the group to various locations within the park to find and identify wild mushrooms, and other ecological features of the park.

• Habitats and timeframes for finding wild mushrooms (mushrooms need rain!)
• Indicator trees and plants that accompany wild mushrooms
• Mushroom family groups, and some important look-alike's 
• Proper cooking instructions (Don't eat raw mushrooms!)
• Storage and dehydration tips
• Wild Mushroom collecting regulations and limits, and protected areas in the park

We start at the Bear Valley Visitor Center at 10:00am.  From there, your foray leader will lead the group (in your own cars) to various locations in the park.  We try take you to trails with relatively easy hiking, but be prepared for variable weather, and possible rain.  

Mother Nature will decide if we find any choice edible mushrooms, but the winter rains bring lots of mushrooms in general, so plenty to talk about.  Maybe you'll be lucky and find a prize chanterelle or porcini!  We can discuss mushroom family groups, learn how to handle poisonous mushrooms, and demonstrate recommended resources for mushroom identification. 

We usually go to 2 or 3 spots in the park, and walk for an hour at each spot.  Bring a lunch for the trail, or snacks, and water.  Good hiking shoes or boots are best, sometimes the trails are slippery.  

We also highly recommend downloading a GPS app on your phone like GAIA or AllTrails to track your walk in the forest, so you don't get lost or turned around. 

The iNaturalist app can help you record and identify mushrooms and plants you may find.

I also recommend the book Mushrooms of the Redwood Coast for identification of mushrooms on the West Coast