darwinbondgraham.bsky.social
Journalist, writer, historian; peripatetic, skeptic; fisherman, amateur pomologist, admirer of wildflowers, mushrooms; worshiper of forests, swamps, deserts, and mountains.
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Prolific Poster
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Here's the full story - oaklandside.org/2025/06/13/w...
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Worst case scenario, you spend all day hiking around the forest and don't find any morels. That's still a great day!
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You'll probably need to cover lots of ground before you find the right habitat and elevation. Once you do, you'll start noticing morels popping from the duff, bare dirt, in the full sun and shade. They're unpredictable.
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The ground should be littered with decaying wood and needles, but not covered too thick. It should be warm and dry, but just a few inches below the surface there should be moisture. The fugus that produces morels relies on water to fruit.
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Elevation and timing are key: hike around 4,000 to 7,000 feet. You want to be be below the snowline where the grass and wildflowers are starting to sprout. Good indicators are fir and pine seedlings sprouting among growing blades of grass and other annuals.
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So-called "natural" morels, Morchella snyderi, associate closely with fir trees, especially Abies concolor (white fir) but also other conifers. You want to spend time in the band of fir forests above the foothills and below the alpine zone.
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In California, morels appear in the Sierra Nevada and Cascades in the spring, mostly between April and June, after the snowmelt. Get to the mountains! 🏔️
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I'm not informed enough to speculate.