Hey folks---So yesterday, I stumble across first a single bright red-orange mushroom, then a whole BATCH of them, maybe 30-40, spread across an area about 10x15 ft. Doug fir/Oregon white oak woods, in SW Washington. Nearby were some humungo whitish/tan mushrooms, 8 inches across and more, very well nibbled; unaffected by the red fungus. Also a lot of white worm coral mushrooms all over the place, plus at least a dozen other interesting small species I didn't try to figure out.

I'm not a mushroom id'er, up to this point only know a few by name, but have been appreciating them for beauty & diversity for many years.

My question: These must be lobster mushrooms. But I haven't seen any references to them growing in numbers. Is this common? It sure was cool! Not to mention kinda eerie.

Also, next question: Is there any way to make long-lasting specimens of mushrooms? (like a herbarium collection of plants) Drying doesn't seem to work very well.

Thanks for any comments/advice.

My book says that they grow solitary, scattered or gregariuos. Usually fruiting from Lactarius and Russula species (they grow from other mushrooms).
I think the other guys on the board might be of more help to you regarding the lobster mushroom. I have never picked any over here on the east coast.

Have you ever seen those globes that you fill with water and put some roses in and then invert?
you could try that with mushrooms but I'm not sure what you'd put in...water is right out,it'd just start growing funky stuff in it
olive oil maybe? or glycerin or isopropal alcohol.
I know there is a way to preserve them in oil so you can eat them later and you can pickle mushrooms.
Isopropal alcohol is pretty cheap about $2 per liter..it's clear and it is used to preserve bugs parasites and tissue samples.
Formaldehyde would work too but it causes cancer and may be hard to get.
and mineral oil may work too but it doesn't harm mycelum so the mushroom may stay "alive" might not work if you want to preserve it in a fixed state
try samples in each and see which ones hold thier color the best.
A good set of pictures is probably the easiest to share and store.
put sections and cross sections on a piece of glass and scan them on a scanner for very detailed close up pictures put spore prints on a half black half white piece of paper and scan those too.

I have seen lobster mushrooms too and there were worm like coral growing nearby(coincidence?)
members15.clubphoto.com/peter627123/2597268/guest.phtml I read they were edible or poison depending on what they grew on.mine were not in groups though and I had no other mushrooms growing close that I could ID as being the host.
I suggest you get a camera and take a few pictures...sounds like a great photo opportunity,fields of Lobster mushrooms.They are pretty sturdy they may still be there.

Thanks for all the great advice! Should've read this before going out in the woods today. All KINDS of weird and beautiful mushrooms growing, now all I have to do is take my book and figure out what the heck they are.

Camera is a great idea, except it's in my kid's clutches up at college currently. Plus, I like having specimens surrounding me. (At my elbow: terrestrial crayfish chimney about 10" high that was one of the very few fragile items the moving company managed to get from IN to WA without breaking---no doubt because the box it was in WASN'T labeled "fragile.") One of those weirdo old-school naturalists.

So we're poking around separately in the woods today above a wild rushing-rapids creek, and I finally notice, hey, it smells like fish, find a place I can peer out, and down below on the bank are hudreds of dead HUMUNGO salmon, piled up at every outward curve of the creek. Also, slightly unsetling, a big bunch of stripped skeletons, obviously bears' work. I keep forgetting I should be watching for bears (and cougars) in these lush, mossy woods. Just so thrilled we have no poisonous snakes (after a decade in copperhead country, always fun at morel time, gah), I guess.

Anyway, thanks again for chiming in. Just wait'll I get that camera back, you'll be sorry ("what's this?" "And this?" "And this?").

tsagaglalal;
Read your note on Lobsters. Yes indeedyLobsters do grow in huge quantities sometimes. My Lady and I picked about seventy pounds one fall in just a couple of hours on the banks of the Fraser River close to a wide spot in the road called Spuzzum, B.C. I dried Lobsters for a week, and let me tell you, lobsters drying do perfume a house! As well as the color the deformity is a key to their identification. Good hunting. Whistle

tsagaglalal

Re: Fuzzy Butts and Large Cats.

Fuzzy butts do not bone their salmon before eating. In the Pacific Northwest we have the fattest and laziest bears in the world---but you DO NOT want to surprise them. When you are in the bush carry a whistle and give that thing a good blow every half hour or so. Little Whistle and I each carry one because, after all, two people going in two different directions can hunt more area than two together. And part of the magic of the hunt is enjoying the solitude of the forest, which you cannot do if you have a tag along, or if you cannot hear a response to a call and you are afraid something nasty has happened to the love of your life.

I had a chance to safely test the whistle thing on the biggest , fattest, healthiest, shiniest, black bear that I have ever seen. This Fuzzy Butt came down the mountain onto the logging road that we were on about fifty feet ahead of us. He wanted to go downhill but the geography was wrong: too steep.. So brer bear started running (or flowing) down the road. I followed, I was doing about thirty klicks and this guy was pulling away on a slight upgrade. It was not my intention to crowd him in any way, and I did not. The typography downhill did not improve for about a half a K and Fuzzy Butt decided to run back up the hill. We stopped on the road and he stopped about forty feet up the hill in the bush. He watched us and we watched him for about five minutes. I figured that it was time to prove our theories about the whistle. I brought it out and gave it a good blast and that beautiful bear was gone uphill like he never existed.

So ,tsagaglalal, Salmon skelatons are almost as common as mushrooms in the Pacific Northwest, but ,as in all things, fear must be tempered with knowledge and respect for the wild life. The predators must not be SURPRISED. The big cats are so rare (except for Vancouver Island) and so shy, that really you only need a whistle.

But you have chosen a site name that is very northern coast: so what greater honor could their be than being eaten by a totem animal?! whistle