Welcome back to Mushroom Monday, your weekly look at some of PEI’s easy-to-identify fungi. Last week we explored the Russula group (aka Brittlegills); today it’s their close relatives, Milkcaps (Lactarius spp.).
Milkcaps are in the Russula Family (Russulaceae) and have the same brittle texture: stems snap if you try and bend them, and gills flake like slivered almonds if you run a finger over them. Despite these similarities, Milkcaps are easily distinguished by the milky fluid that appears when you cut or break these mushrooms (Photo 1). While there are few absolutes with fungi, a brittle mushroom that exudes a milky juice is most likely a Milkcap.
Like Russulas, Milkcaps are easy to identify as a group but confirming which of the many hundreds of species you have can be far more challenging. Colour of the fungus and its milk, any change in colour when cut or bruised, smell, taste, and habitat are all useful clues.
No mushroom can harm you unless you swallow it. Nibbling a piece to determine the taste and then spitting it out is safe, even with toxic species. Photo 1 shows white-fleshed mushrooms with white milk that didn’t change colour when cut. They were found under mixed hardwoods and the taste was surprisingly (and instantly) spicy-hot. Those features point to the well-named and inedible Peppery Milkcap (Lactarius piperatus).
Some Milkcaps are considered choice edibles, particularly those with orange latex grouped in a section of the family called Deliciosi. Two of these commonly found on PEI are Lactarius deterrimus (Photo 2, formerly called L. deliciosus) and Lactarius thyinos. They look similar and both are edible, though the one shown turns green when bruised and is considered less tasty than its colourfast relative.
Lactarius deterrimus is among the wild species I’ve eaten, but I found it bland and rank it as fair. Far better is the Curry Milkcap (Lactarius camphoratus) – sometimes called Candy Cap – with its wonderful maple-syrup-like smell, thin white milk, and sweet taste. That’s definitely a Milkcap I’d go out of my way to collect again!
Some of the best edible members of this family – both Russulas and Milkcaps – are those that have been parasitized by a mold called Hypomyces lactifluorum and transformed into Lobster Mushrooms (Photo 3). Amazingly, this infection can turn an otherwise inedible or mediocre fungus into a choice edible. The original mushroom is unrecognizable, but Lobsters are unmistakable; you can read more about them here: https://www.pei-untamed.com/post/lobster-mushroom.
Milkcaps are mycorrhizal, forming relationships with plants including both hardwood and softwood trees. By sharing water and nutrients with trees in exchange for carbohydrates (sugars) the trees make via photosynthesis, mycorrhizal fungi are important to forest ecosystems.
Milkcaps and Russulas can be found in forests from the tropics to the taiga (northern Boreal) and contribute to forest health and diversity. While there’s been much talk about the potential effects of climate change on trees, they don’t exist in isolation. Forests are communities created by complex interactions among plants, animals, and fungi – many of which researchers are still working to understand. It can be easy to think that moving individual tree species outside their existing ranges is a viable adaptation strategy. It’s far harder to understand how forest communities work together, what adaptive capacity they have, and what new communities may form without our intervention.
As a group, Milkcaps are relatively easy to identify and it’s fun to explore their various colours, smells, and tastes. Now that you know what to look for, I bet you’ll be finding these interesting parts of PEI untamed!
Comments