To be honest I don't recall the last time I've ever accidentally picked up a poisonous specimen along with the good ones I was intending to pick. At this point it's such second-nature that telling apart an edible vs. poisonous mushroom is like telling a bottle of milk from a bottle of Drano. And yet I still examine each one at home before putting it in the pot.

The other thing is that the truly deadly varieties, such as the subject of this article - Amanita phalloides, are really not that hard to avoid. When you're a novice forager, there are plenty of varieties that don't look remotely like Amanita, and are much easier to differentiate.

There are some hardcore foragers who even consume certain varieties of Amanita (some of which are edible!), but to me this would be too much of a hassle, since it would involve spore prints and maybe even microscopy of the spores to be absolutely sure.

I think I read somewhere before about how if a mushroom is white, then stay away from it. How true is this from your experience?

Using that rule of thumb, you would successfully avoid Amanita virosa (destroying angel), but you could still get poisoned by Amanita phalloides (death cap) which has a pale-green cap.

I don't endorse any rules-of-thumb for foraging, but a much better differentiator for beginners is whether the mushroom has pores vs. gills under the cap. There are virtually no deadly varieties that have pores.

> There are virtually no deadly varieties that have pores.

Never heard this one before. Adding it to my bug out notes. Thanks!

Note that there's at least one, and that a number of them will still make you sick.

Put a few common pored edibles (Laetiporus sp., Cantharellus sp., Grifola frondosa, etc.) in your notes for sure though, with basic descriptions, as even their few remote lookalikes (at least pored ones -- some people think Omphalotus sp. look like Cantharellus for some reason) are just going to give you a moderate stomach upset at worst, and may be edible themselves.

> Put a few common pored edibles (... Cantharellus sp

Chantarelles don't have pores?

Derp; I meant non-gilled. Thanks for the correction. The false gills on chanterelles are a major part of why they're so accessible to new foragers.

They’re not deadly but there are quite a few ones with pores that will make you very sick.

I avoid white and white-ish (i.e.: green-white). It significantly a but not totally- reduces the risk in my area.

Everything else a good book for identification. If its not 100% clear that it is editable, it gets thrown away.

The parasol mushroom [1] is one of the most popular foraged mushrooms in my part of the world and is white-ish.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macrolepiota_procera

Amanita sec caesarae doesn't require spore prints or microscopy to be affirmatively ID'd as safe. You have to check for the presence of a few characteristics, but it's a fairly safe ID for experienced foragers. Blushers and grisettes, however... I've seen too many people in mushroom groups misidentify those to ever recommend them to others.

Most Amanitas have a prominent base (volva) but I expect too many pickers just pull out by the stem so might not notice it.

"Old school" foragers typically stick to a few mushrooms to be safe. Meaning, they have quite an expertise on 3 or 4 kinds of mushrooms and are staying away from anything else, especially, if there is a similar, poisonous mushroom. (At least, this is what all I happen to know are doing.) Also, if you aren't 100% confident, stay away from it. (And there is the real problem with apps, since lack of confidence is the entire raison d'être of these apps.)

rather 20-30 but I live in europe, in america you are different kind of human :D

America has thousands, if not millions, of invisible people living from the land and amongst the trees -- but you're right that our city dwellers don't know many wild plants.

The most obvious examples are our two major trails, the Pacific Coast and the Appalachian, which take a full year to hike and are done by tens of thousands annually.

When I was younger I would go foraging and I would indeed stick to just the few species of very common mushroom that grew in the woods near me, that I could recognise for sure, with very distinct characteristics.

Then I moved to another city just a few hundreds of km away, and I couldn't collect many mushrooms anymore. The mushrooms variaties were quite different. The ones I could recognise were not so common anymore, and I didn't know the other ones. I stopped foraging now, because I don't have the urge to learn mushrooms again.

This is the way. Grandma teaches you her 3 or 4 favorites, you find them for her, and then she checks them herself. My wife is passing on this passion to our kids and my 4 year old already knows (1) which are good and (2) the only way to eat a wild mushroom is on the plate, after mommy checked and cooked it.