Edible Fungi Guide Book

[Gupps]

Can anyone please recommend the best guide for picking edible fungi guide book. I currently use the collins field guide which is good and compact with well taken photographs.

However this book does not go into quite as much detail as i would like and tends to only talk of and show perfect specimens. Id like a book that maybe mentions variations in color ect within species.

Also the collins book is organised horribly with no key working its way though the book and species seemingly entered in a hap hazard order. Apart from the book been split into stem and cap, ball and bracket fungii there appears to be no logic as to the organising of fungii in it, leeding me to literally flick through the entire book when trying to identify things.


If poss i would like abook that shows micrographs of the spores too as i work in a lab and have access to high powered light microscopes, which i beleive could help me identify species with a greater degree of certainty..

anyhow.. any suggestions... whats the definitive guide to buy with a view towards eating shrooms?

[solus]

This thread a while back referred to books with microscopic info:
Books on microscopic features

A couple of helpful books for general ID are "The Encyclopedia of Fungi of Britain and Europe" by Michael Jordan, and Roger Phillips' Mushrooms book (can't remember the full title). The latter has a useful on-line resource at Rogers Mushrooms | Mushroom Pictures & Mushroom Reference

However: neither of these, nor, I suspect, any other book should be used for identifying "edible" species as there are far too many pitfalls and similarities in identification criteria for safety.

Personally, I would only ever eat mushrooms that are commercially grown and come from the farm shop or supermarket!

[cybershot]

Originally Posted by solus

Personally, I would only ever eat mushrooms that are commercially grown and come from the farm shop or supermarket!

"You don't know what you're missing" and if I'm wrong you can use it as my epitaph, LOL

Back to the subject for Gupps :

The "River Cottage Handbook No1: Mushrooms" is a fun and informative read.

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