"echinosum" wrote in message ...

'Guv Bob[_2_ Wrote:
;975497']Howdy folks, can someone identify these front yard mushrooms
and give me some pointers on how to tell if they are edible or not?
Location is So Calif.

Thanks in advance.

'Imageshack - mushrm01.jpg' (http://tinyurl.com/ab7lyt4)
'Imageshack - mushrm02.jpg' (http://tinyurl.com/avrbplm)
'Imageshack - mushrm03.jpg' (http://tinyurl.com/bddbn75)
'Imageshack - mushrm04.jpg' (http://tinyurl.com/acam27k)

Guv Bob
They look rather old, dried up and shrivelled, which makes
identification difficult. For example, gill colour is an important
feature for identification, and in the pictures the gills are presenting
brown. But I suspect the brown colour may be just because the mushrooms
are rather old and shrivelled, rather than being their true colour.

Mushrooms with brown gills and a ring are usually Agaricus, ie, the
group containing the cultivated mushroom. Most Agaricus are edible - if
you are going to eat wild-collected Agaricus you need to learn about the
few that aren't. You also need to be absolutely sure it isn't one of the
deadly poisonous mushrooms that can be mistaken for Agaricus. One
doesn't eat this kind of mushroom without being absolutely sure what
they are. A key feature of identifying Agaricus is that that the ring is
loose, it isn't attached to the stem. And that doesn't appear to be the
case here. So I'm suspecting that this is not actually Agaricus.

Other features of the mushroom, apart from gill colour, suggest
Lepiota/Macrolepiota (only recently divided into two), which includes
(in Macrolepiota) the delicious and easily identified parasol mushrooms.
Lepiota also includes poisonous mushrooms, so is not a group to wander
outside the easily identified parasols. Well I eat parasols because they
are obvious to me; others who are less sure should beware.
(Macro)Lepiota should have white gills, so that feature looks wrong, but
I'm wondering whether they might age brown. Old (Macro)lepiota are
often riddled with grubs, so that's a reason not to eat the old ones.

The other group that Agaricus is too frequently mistaken for is Amanita,
a group containing some especially deadly funguses, as well as a few of
good edible ones. Amanita usually (but not all) has white gills, but
gain I'm wondering how they age. One has to be very sure about this as
mistakes can be fatal. My relatives eat Amanita rubescens in very large
quantities, because they are used to it that they can reliably
distinguish it from deadly poisonous Amanita pantherina. I'm less sure,
so I won't eat it when they aren't there to check for me.

In sum, it is probably a waste of time trying to identify these as they
are already long past prime eating condition. And this mushroom is bang
in the middle of an area of identification where mistakes can be fatal,
which would be another reason for me not to eat it at all unless you
were completely sure exactly what it is. I would say you shouldn't even
consider eating this unless you are already completely sure what it is,
because you eat it frequently.




--
echinosum

Belated thanks for all this good info. FYI, the mushrooms in the photos were fresh - taken 2 days after then first appeared in the lawn.