Morels, Truffles and other Spring Mushrooms
by Michael W. Beug Email: beugm@evergreen.edu
The Evergreen State College, Olympia WA
Slide 35.
Rhizopogon occidentalis is a common white to yellow western
species with a pleasant flavor. It is one of several species that stain
orange to reddish when cut or bruised. Like other members of the genus,
the interior is sponge-like, firm and rubbery, usually white when young
and becoming cinnamon-brown to dingy olive-brown to grayish at maturity.
The odor of rhizopogons can be fruity, wine-like, cheesy, or spicy-pungent.
I recently found one with a delightful chocolate odor, but indifferent
flavor. However, a flying squirrel 40 feet up a tree can smell the ripe
rhizopogon and zero in on a meal. For the mushroom this is a real evolutionary
advantage over epigeous, or above-ground, mushrooms. The hypogeous, or
below-ground, mushrooms do not have to spend energy forming a stem and
fruit body and can remain hidden until the spores are mature, spending
only a small amount of energy forming the scent chemicals to attract small
mammals to a meal, spreading their spores through the fecal pellets.
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