Review -- Sandy Sheine/NAMA/The Mycophile

The Good, the Bad, and the Deadly: Knowing the Poisonous Mushrooms, for Mushroom Hunters, Chefs, Parents, Pet Owners, & Medical Professionals, by Taylor Lockwood, is a very professional, well-researched, and comprehensive video on poisonous mushrooms and the toxicology of fungi.
Not only is it accurate and informative, but we are also treated to his fabulous, beautiful photographs which illustrate the video. The main program is 50 minutes long; with extras, approximately an hour. It is available from the web site www.kingdomoffungi.com at a cost of $24.95 + postage.

The author’s aim is to teach us about toxic mushrooms and their edible look-alikes. Like his previous excellent video, The Mushroom Identification Trilogy, this video is divided into three parts: Part I introduces poisonous mushrooms, warning against eating old mushrooms because they may be attacked by insects, bacteria, or slugs. If you think you may have mushroom poisoning, you should note the latency—which he defines as the time between eating a mushroom and the onset of symptoms of illness.

Part II covers basic mushroom identification. Taylor urges us to be observant and try to identify a mushroom from its cap, its spore-bearing surface, its stem, and base; the colors of the cap, the pore-bearing surface, the stem and the base; and any other identifying features such as a ring on the stem or the shape of the base. He suggests that we carefully study the habitat and make spore prints. These features are illustrated with many examples of toxic and edible mushrooms.

Part III, the longest part of the video, describes in detail and illustrates members of eight groups of toxins and the mushrooms that contain them. Taylor provides expert advice on cooking and eating mushrooms; counsel on how to avoid poisoning yourself and others (keep a fresh sample of any mushrooms that you are eating, in case you do become ill) and, in case you suspect a toxic reaction to mushrooms, the Poison Control Center phone number: (800) 222-1222.

If you do plan to eat wild mushrooms, use this video to learn which ones are toxic. Along with the video is a booklet in which Taylor cautions: “This program is presented for informational and educational purposes and not as a guide for mushroom edibility. Don’t eat any mushroom based only upon what you see here. Always have a local expert show you what is good to eat and what is not.” Wise words. Thank you, Taylor, for adding so much information to our knowledge of toxic and edible mushrooms.

—Sandy Sheine