Northeastern foragers, watch out - the mighty morel is marching your way at a staggering rate! Morels are already fruiting in West Virginia and Ohio, and I expect them to arrive in southern Pennsylvania within the next week. This means morels should be fruiting two to three full weeks ahead of schedule throughout most of the region.

My chaga eyes are on, and I am having trouble turning them off. Despite the disconcertingly warm winter, Northern Vermont still has powder stashes if you know where to look (if there’s one thing mushroom foragers and skiers have in common, it’s that we don’t disclose the locations of our coveted patches). 

The ground may be frozen, but a mushroom menagerie has popped up in Cornell’s Mann Library. “The Other Side of What? Adventures in Fungal Wonderland” features photographs taken by members of the Ithaca community during 2011’s bountiful wild mushroom season. Several of The Mushroom Forager’s photographs are displayed in the exhibit, which will be up until April 30. 

Of all the stately trees native to the Northeast, it is hard not to take a special liking to the paper birch (Betula papyrifera). Its peeling ivory bark, which happens to be an unparalleled fire starter, reveals a mini-sunset of yellow, salmon, and purplish hues on closer examination. Though it is native throughout the Northeast, the paper birch is most common in the Northern part of the region, where its cold hardiness gives it a competitive advantage. I recently moved to Burlington, VT, putting me in prime birch country.