When we prepared to go to Michigan in mid-October this year, we were only thinking about all the things we’d be doing with seven grandkids and their parents, Brett and Sarah. We hadn’t thought much about primetime Fall colors in a mostly forested state. But the eye-popping diversity of trees demanded our attention while we traveled through the state. The stately ancient oaks with their shades of crimson, gold and still green leaves were astonishing. Now I was thinking more about oak trees and the possible fungi at their bases than grandkids. When I did think about the kids, I mainly wondered if they’d want to go mushroom hunting.
Thoughts changed instantly when we arrived to see kids running around with excitement. The littlest one, two-year-old Margo came carrying a large hen that was more than half as big as she is. Last year this little farmer was much more of a baby who barely knew us. Now she was all kid and all about showing us her chicken. The other kids said “Oh yeah that’s Margo’s pet. For some reason it likes her and lets her catch it.” The family has about thirty chickens now and sells some of their eggs. Some of the larger chickens including her pet can fly over the tall fence around the chicken yard but they always return at night and lay their eggs in the coop – good birds. Margo’s hen decided to fly back into the chicken yard after Margo put it in her wagon and tried to give it a ride. Apparently that kind of activity seemed a bit reckless to the bird.
A favorite activity of the kids and Sally is treasure hunts which involve drawing of elaborate and sometimes hard to decipher series of maps leading to the treasure. Once the maps are hidden in their pictured locations the race is on! I often wonder how good it is for Sally to be running after the kids like that, but then SHE isn’t the 70 year-old goof who bonked his head while doing tricks on the trampoline, so I have no room to criticize her behavior.
All the watching of treasure hunts and Margo chasing her hen made me think of the treasure I was hoping to find in Michigan’s lovely forests: hen-of-the-woods or maitake (Grifola frondosus) – Just “hen” for short. So it was music to my ears when Isaac the twelve-year-old asked me, “Can we go mushroom hunting?” and his dad, Brett, replied “We’ll go to a park with big trees tomorrow.”
After a fun night with many games including my humiliating losses at both chess and backgammon to nine-year-old Norah, the trip to the park really happened. The towering oak and beech trees were definitely big and lovely. Isaac, Norah and I went for the mushroom walk. We found lots of polypores but not many gilled mushrooms. It had been dry there. Norah was excited to learn about artist fungus when we found several on a large oak log. I said it was ok for her to take a small one to draw on with a twig. She wrote “I love you mom!” on it and gave it to Sarah.
Finally, we found a hen about fifty yards from the playground. It was a small but mature clump. When I examined it at home I noticed anomalies. The large angular pores running down the stalks didn’t extend to the darkened ends of the fronds, plus they were shallower than I expected. Though it was fresh the tough dark ends with their smooth pore surface reminded me of Meripilus. I was familiar with the blackening polypore (Meripilus sp.) but only when younger, and easily bruising black on the smooth pore surface. I simply couldn’t be positive I had Grifola and not Meripilus.
It was embarrassing to admit that I wasn’t quite sure about a fungus that I’ve had more experience with than any. Fortunately Alan Bergo, the Forager Chef gave Meripilus a good review: https://foragerchef.com/the-black-staining-polypore-meripilus-sumstinei/ so I chopped it in very small pieces and simmered it in chicken broth, a method that’s effective for both Meripilus and very mature hens. We prepared only a small amount to go with dinner and tossed the rest to the chickens due to my uncertainty. It was tasty and definitely hen flavored when I finally took a bite. I realized that I could have cooked a bite earlier and tasted it to end my confusion before it even started. I guess that sometimes my judgement is for the birds.
The next evening, we went for a family walk/bike ride on the gravel road next to their house. The walk was a delightful experience with fourteen-year-old Caleb leading the older kids on bikes. Meanwhile, we the adults chatted and pushed a double stroller that four-year-old Olive and Margo were in – and out of depending on what rocks, flowers and sticks they wanted us to stop for.
About a half mile from their home, a towering solitary oak grew right next to the road in tall grass. Its lower branches were long gone, and its trunk had a large scar, but its high canopy looked healthy. It was a perfect tree to host hens and, indeed, on the back side, hidden from the road, it hosted two perfect hen clumps which were still young. However, one was already massive. I lopped off a third of the larger clump to take home. Isaac and six-year-old Hazel helped me clean and bag three lbs. to go directly in their freezer. That left 5 lbs. remaining.
Seventeen-year-old Ellie is an entrepreneur. She’s sold flowers in the past and is doing amazingly well selling Legos now days. When I said the hen would get at least ten bucks a pound if they wanted to sell it along with their eggs she perked right up. Sarah was thinking about freeze drying and dehydrating, however. Whatever they did with it, they still had at least 15 lbs. sitting at the tree even after Sally and I returned and lopped off 5 or 6 lbs. to take home with us. One of the kids asked how I knew the hens would be growing on that tree. I said it just looked like a good candidate, but I also thought that maybe it had something to do with God smiling on that family.
On our way home we visited Sarah’s parents, Tom and Betsy, and her grandad, Ralph. Ralph’s at that age where we especially treasure every visit with him. Tom had me look at some mushrooms growing in soil where he’d recently planted grass. They were Agaricus bitorquis. I call them yummy curbside mushrooms. I felt another smile. They went great with hens when we got home.
On the way home the trees were even more colorful. I believe that those colors were yet one more smile from our creator, and that smile is for everyone who sees the beauty around them.
