Photo from July 9

Right now chanterelles are just starting to fruit. Last year, our first foraging for mushrooms, we found them in Hyde Park. Not a lot, just a small patch, enough for a cheese and chanterelle omelette; that location hasn't shown any activity yet though, and we haven't hit that mother lode spot that many veterans have. So, off to explore new spots.

Tuesday we ventured to Wilcox Park in Milan, Dutchess County. It's a county park that offers swimming, ball fields, camping and a number of hiking trails. Any day that we actually find something good in the mushroom family we consider a good day. Sometimes you find what you're looking for; sometimes you find something new and unusual. Being that I haven't hiked at Wilcox Park in at least five years, and didn't have mushrooms on my mind back then, I had no idea what we would find.

We took to the trail off the parking lot and got pooped really quick going up and down some fairly steep hills. Eventually we found the hiking trail I had traveled once before. Unlike last year at this time, the ground was exceedingly dry. We quickly realized that if we were to find anything today we would need to stick to creek beds and wet spots. Though, I say wet spots loosely. The ground was so dry many of the wet spots were pretty much dried with the plants starting to brown out. We knew we were getting to better spots when the mosquitos forced us to get out the pest sprays.

It's rather fun meandering through dry or semi-dry creek beds. You get to see the lay of the land from a different perspective. And it's easier to see under the plant growth along the edge of the bed. Coming around a bend we finally found what we were looking for: chanterelles! Just getting started, there were a few taking shape with a few dozen little orange spots scattered throughout the leaves where others would be popping up any time soon.

For us, it's officially chanterelle season now. We can just hope for a little more rain…