Best Fungi book

[Petee]

Hi fungi experts!
i'm a new member starting to learn.
i have been practising ID with my Rogers field guide (which is really good!) and i am able to sort out the easy ones like Shaggy inkcap, Shaggy parasol and Shaggy Pholotis (lots of Shaggy ones ), but i want to be able to learn more by getting a really good encyclopedia for a Christmas prezzy that i can leave at home and refer to.
i have been looking at :
Encyclopaedia of Fungi of Britain and Europe – Jordan
or
The complete encyclopaedia of Mushrooms - Keizer
or
The Great encyclopaedia of Mushrooms - Lamaison

and would really appreciate your views on these or any other before i spent my hard-earnt.

Many thanks,

[NickCantle]

Hi Petee, welcome to WAB. You're getting yourself into a decent hobby

From the list, I think the most common and most reputable one is Jordan's encyclopedia. It's very informative, but as most guides do, you'll find it contradicts every other

[diggleken]

Although by no means an expert, I find Jordan works really well (and is relatively cheap on tinternet), but also use Roger Phillips, but as Nick says, there are variations in books.
I also find a cheaper, less in depth guide helps with common names, not always in the more learned tomes, which vary too!
Then the latin/scientific/biological names often change too!
WAB is also very helpful of course.
But its great fun and exciting to find fungi.
Cheers
Ken

[Petee]

Thanks for the reply Nick.
i have been interested for a while, but really got enthused about a month ago when i visited a friend in the Pyrenees who took me to some magical forests filled with every imaginable sort of mushroom.
Since then i have spent every spare hour scouring the local countryside learning from what i have found.
P

[NickCantle]

I think a resource like WAB can easily match the information you'll get out of a book, so visit frequently, read everything fungal and ask questions

[Petee]

Thanks Nick, i have been!! (good job the Boss is off )

and by reading the forum i know this is an impossible question, but i'll ask anyway (i'll probably get away with it being a newbee);
Last week, i found this scarlet 'waxcap' (shiny variably red and paler in parts cap) with lovely velvet crimson gills in a old meadow near where i live (sorry no photo), it is about 5 cm high, 3cm across the cap with a high domed cap (like a round based pyramid??). Any ideas?

Thanks P

[NickCantle]

Hmm, sounds odd. The shape of the cap sounds like that of Hygrocybe conica, but the gills of this species are usually yellow(ish). The only Hygrocybe of that size that has a scarlet cap and crimson gills is Hygrocybe Miniata. Trouble is, that doesn't usually have a conical cap, it's usually domed.

[Petee]

Thanks Nick,
i have checked these on the A-Z and conica looks like the critter,
although the underside was definately reddish, as was the stem?
I'll have to remember to take a snap next time.
P

[NickCantle]

Remember Pete, a photograph of the specimen in situ', a photograph of the gills and notes on smell and taste (when confident enough), will increase your chances of a positive ID. However, all of that information being present doesn't guarantee you an ID, and many times does it come down to the microscopy.

[Petee]

will do!!
the only one's i have tasted so far have been Cep, chantarelle, Oyster and Shaggy Inkcap (all cooked and very nice) and a yellow capped bolete (about 9cm across) with non staining lemon pores i thought was Larch Boletus? but on a small pan trial tasted better than expected.
like most people, i suppose the interest begins with the fact that there are some you can eat, and then extends when you start to learn more about fungi in general.
P