And they say lightning doesn’t strike twice. Either it’s beginner’s luck or I am some sort of idiot savant of mushroom foraging, but just two days after finding the enormous chicken mushroom, I came across this extraordinary hen-of-the-woods! Once again, I was driving, this time coming back from my weekly shopping trip to the farm. I simply glanced out the window and there, recessed in the woods, at the base of a large, rotting oak stump and illuminated by a single shaft of dappled sunlight, with this gorgeous, ruffled mound. Surely not, I thought to myself. And then screeched to the side of the road and plunged into the forest. I was cackling like a madwoman as I brought this into the house, as drunk with victory as a conquering Roman. And then, this morning, up for my constitutional at 7am, I came across yet another hen-of-the woods! Not as big as the first one, but still 5 gloriously fresh pounds of it! And some chanterelles, to boot!

the second hen-of-the-woods haul

G said I needed to add something for scale in the photo. This baby is about the size of a very large watermelon. Grifola frondosa, also known by its Japanese name of maitake, is a polypore mushroom that grows in clusters at the base of trees, particularly oaks. This one was growing from the base of an old oak stump. It’s one of the choicest wild edibles, with a rich yet delicate flavor and a smooth, meaty texture.

it has gorgeous ruffles in varying shades of buff, tan and cream

Maitake is rich in minerals (potassium, calcium and magnesium), vitamins, fiber and amino acids. It has long been used medicinally in Asia, and current research now indicates that it enhances immune function and regulates blood pressure and insulin levels.

the mushroom often grows around pine needles and small branches

Cleaning the enormous one was a bit of a process, as the base was full of pine needles, moss and dirt, and there were plenty of spiders and other bugs living inside. We brought some of it to our friends at Beaver Dam last night, along with some chicken mushroom and some of Tomo’s foraged black chanterelles, and they just happened to have freshly-made ricotta gnocchi waiting for us! It was a match made in culinary heaven.

i was extremely thrilled to find even one black chanterelle (aka black trumpet)

i’m still hoping to find a huge patch of these prized yellowfoot chanterelles

not to mention more of these glorious golden ones

these also look like chanterelles, I can’t find this color mentioned anywhere

If you ever get tired of eating your wild mushrooms cooked with butter and cream and spooned over pasta, gnocchi, toast or polenta, try Thomas Keller’s riff on a classic Basque recipe that calls for sizzling and then storing the mushrooms in good olive oil. Eat them with cheese, with roast chicken or mixed into a salad.

A-foraging I went and I didn’t find one thing I was hoping for. No morels, no edible fiddleheads, not a single solitary ramp. And yet, it was truly a glorious day. The mighty Delaware, full of silt stirred up by the recent rains, is flowing the color of milky coffee. Eighty degrees out, with gentle breezes, fluffy cumulus clouds like globs of marshmallow cream in a Tiffany blue sky. The kind of weather sure to rouse even the drowsiest bear and summon the rattlesnakes from their stony bowers. I confess, I devoted a fair amount of mental energy conjuring up scenarios in which I was lunch. A trio of turkey vultures circling overhead didn’t help matters much. But in the end, I was sufficiently distracted by all the green living things teeming on the forest floor.

wild cress has a delightful peppery flavor

i think this is a type of trillium; i love the mottled/marbled leaves

these red tree fungi were about the size of dinner plates

hay-scented fern fiddleheads; the edible kind are from ostrich ferns

this darling frog sat right in my palm

a soft and feathery lichen

tiny wild violets, full of vitamin C, are cropping up all over

The marshy area in the woods behind our house is bursting with the sounds (and occasional sights) of new life. The rains and melting snow have united in large vernal pools that are the breeding ground for frogs and salamanders. You can hear their trilling and chuckling, great crowds of them creating a cacophany that we once took for an enormous flock of geese. When you draw near, they all go silent of course, so a stealthy approach is essential. We did scare a couple of ducks who took off, leaving behind a lavish breakfast buffet of bugs and water creatures. Here’s a quick visual tour of some of the natural wonders we came across yesterday morning.

a wasps’ nest

This type of wasps’ nest is generally seen hanging way up high in a tree, so it was unusual to come across one like this, woven into the branches of a small bush. The tenants are long gone, but it was a bit too soggy and ragged after a long winter to add to our cabinet of curios.

see the cloud-like deposits of eggs on the upper right of the mossy area?

Frogs and salamanders both lay their eggs in very similar jelly-like masses and I’ve yet to determine the difference, so these might be either. We definitely heard frogs, but when I poked the waters’ edge with the toe of my welly, I saw some spotted salamanders moving around.

the wet brings out the fungi and lichen, and the slugs who feast on rotting vegetation

2 years ago we found the remains of a turtle in the marsh; bits of him still turn up

the moss is showing brilliant green and soon ferns will line all these waterways

this gorgeous toad was peeking out from the bramble in our own garden

It’s day 7 of my juice fast. The simple act of taking food out of the equation can be hugely transformative. Our relationship to eating tends to be very complex, because it provides not only nourishment but comfort, sensual pleasure and perhaps a buffer to shield us from some of our deepest feelings. One thing I grapple with is the herpes virus that I have carried in my body since 1985. During that time it has been more and less active, but seems to have migrated now to reside in my sacrum, a very vulnerable spot indeed. Os sacrum is Latin for “the seat of the soul.” This area seems to have become very congested for me, and I sense that lower back pain, writing blocks and deep fears are all lodged here. On day 3 of my fast, after a couple of dull headaches, including one that woke me in the night, and a surge of the virus in my system, I began to feel like all my defenses and resources were falling away. I slipped back into a pattern of self-doubt and recrimination, where I relive the life-long pain of feeling like a disappointment to my parents. I also felt very isolated and out of my element. This was probably exacerbated by the fact that our week-long bathroom renovation is now in its frustrating and enraging fourth week, and we are still availing ourselves of the incredible hospitality of our dear friend who has lent us his house at Beaver Dam.

brook no nonsense

The house is beautiful, as are the surroundings, but between finishing pages that were due to my writing group and the incessant rain for two days, I had not been outside since Thursday. But somewhere between a wonderful talk I had with my extraordinarily wise and loving husband, and a long snowshoe I took yesterday through the wet woods, along a roaring brook recently sprung to life, a shimmering clarity came over me. I saw that in frequently being too hard on myself (something everyone always tells me I am and which never fails to bewilder me), I am keeping alive the voice of my parents—but the wrong voice. I expect a lot from myself, too much perhaps, but I am going to try now to be more gentle and to strive to do more often what truly makes me happy. All this from juice? you ask.

the promise of spring

I can’t really underestimate the effect of a fast. The body is purging itself of toxins, and perhaps negative emotions are attached to some of these. Even if fasting does not always bring about heightened awareness, it is surely cleansing. My skin is clearer, my eyes brighter, my joints less achy, my vital energy enhanced. I think the effects of water fasting would be much more profound, and I would like to graduate to that at some point. For those of you who are horrified at the idea of going without food for even a day, perhaps you need to learn a little bit more about what it can do for you. After all, fasting has been considered therapeutic for thousands of years. Here are a few good resources to check out, even if you just read about them online:

Fasting Can Save Your Life by Herbert Shelton, an early proponent of fasting

The Miracle of Fasting by Patricia and Paul Bragg, creators of Bragg’s Enzymes etc

Prescription for Nutritional Healing by Phyllis A. Balch – I love this book

this is what I thaw

Such gorgeous weather this weekend, perfect for a walk in the woods. The wild turkey and deer abound; half a dozen turtles are sunning themselves on an old log in the lake; and the musical cackle of migrating geese fills the air. Even if you don’t live in the country, I hope these photos inspire you to drive to a nearby forest or visit your local park to take in a few of the sights and sounds of this glorious season.

a snake basks in the late afternoon sun

wasps were crawling in and around this bit of nest

nearby was this mud dauber nest resembling a pipe organ

mud daubers like to feast on orb weavers like the one below

this one is slightly different from the one we saw on our house last fall

witch hazel’s spindly yellow blossoms are often the last spot of color visible in the woods

this puffball is one of many mushrooms that pop up after the rain

i need to get better at identifying these fungi

this is a milkweed pod on its way to drying out

when they burst open, the seeds fly away on a mass of incredibly silky floss

breaking open a cattail reveals another kind of soft fluff

it instantly expands into a mass of ethereal flyaway seeds

so much beauty, such intense and fleeting colors

roger tory peterson and a young osprey    photo by alfred eisenstaedt

I had my first guest-post on a kindred spirit’s blog this week. The visionary Peter Buchanan-Smith honored me with a feature on his fascinating blog, Best Made Projects. We share an interest in the natural world, so when he asked me to review a field guide, I chose one by the naturalist and early environmentalist Roger Tory Peterson (seen above holding a movie camera mounted on a gun stock). Peter has kindly allowed me to re-post my review in its entirety here.

FIELDING QUESTIONS: A Review of Roger Tory Peterson Field Guides – Eastern Forests

Returning home to Sullivan County from the stinky summer streets of New York City brings a surge of relief and gratitude: the cool night air filled with the rustle of leaves and the throbbing drone of cicadas is a tonic. The woods I now call home are not the same as those I grew up with in the Santa Cruz mountains of California. Fog-shrouded sequoias and wild surf are here replaced with blazing summers and snowy winters among the hawthorn, hickory, maple and pine. The Steller’s jay of my youth is now the equally brazen blue jay of my mid-life. The fence around our small property does little to keep out all the critters that also live here, and long rambles on our kind neighbor’s thousand acres have led to countless discoveries, animal, mineral and botanical.

How then to begin to understand all these natural wonders? Each season brings uniquely intriguing sights and sounds, its own miraculous unfoldings. Where to turn to identify this orange amphibian, that proliferating fern, the eerie sound of that night creature?

There is no more reliable and exhaustive source than Roger Tory Peterson (1908–1996). An American naturalist, ornithologist, artist and educator, he was one of the founding inspirations for the 20^th-century environmental movement. No one of the past century has done more to promote an interest in living creatures. In 1934, he published the first modern field guide, his seminal Guide to the Birds. It sold out its first printing of 2‚000 copies in one week, and went through 5 subsequent editions. His detailed paintings and simplified method of identifying birds helped the layman become familiar with species through their easily observed “field marks,” rather than by the old “bird in the hand” method, thus replacing the shotgun with binoculars as the birder’s instrument of choice. Soon, his techniques were applied to all manner of flora and fauna.

My green leather-bound, gilt-edged Roger Tory Peterson Field Guides Eastern Forests – North America (written by John C. Kricher, illustrated by Gordon Morrison and edited by the master himself) is a boon companion through all seasons. As the winter snows melted this year, I opened my book to “Patterns of Spring,” and headed into the forest to the vernal pools where spotted salamanders lay their jelly-like egg masses. I discovered that the small red efts crawling on the woodland floor on early summer mornings were in their interim terrestrial stage—an adaptation that helps them disperse—and would have an unpleasant “peppery” taste designed to repel predators. I returned to the book to positively identify what turned out to be yellow-bellied sapsuckers drilling away at our old lichen-covered maple, and to learn more about the wily woodchuck that has attacked our vegetable garden two years running.

The first chapter acknowledges that “everyone begins to use a field guide by thumbing through the pages and looking at the plates of illustrations,” and, indeed, this 1988 edition has beautiful visuals that do justice to their subjects. But what’s genius about this particular field guide is that it places emphasis on the way plants and animals interact together, so you really gain an understanding of what a habitat entails. You learn the differences between a Boreal Bog (a wet, mossy place) and a Northern Hardwood Forest (full of Sugar Maple, White Pine and Eastern Hemlock) in terms of who lives there and what they eat.

Why is this good? Why do male juncos winter farther north than females? Why do some spider webs have thick zigzag strands? Why don’t herbivores eat all the leaves? Why ask why? For the answers to these and other pressing questions on the natural world, I refer you directly to Roger Tory Peterson Field Guides Eastern Forests – North America, which is laden with “Observations and Explanations,” and from whence came this illuminating statement:

“Why-type questions are ultimate-type questions. They identify the most  interesting aspects of natural history, those of adaptation and survival. The answers to ultimate-type questions reveal the actual fabric that holds nature together. Being able to ask and answer ultimate questions about natural history adds a new and powerful dimension to your understanding of nature.”

Last weekend we took our houseguests exploring in the woods behind our house. The air was fresh and clean, the sun was shining, the woodpeckers were tapping out a beat and there were plenty of newts and tadpoles to ogle. It’s amazing to think that just a couple hours out of the city you can be an entire world away. (Or at the designer outlets at Woodbury Commons, for that matter.) The last photo, of the snake, was actually taken in our front yard. The first garden snake of the season…

Now that spring is here, most mornings G and I will head into the woods behind our property where all manner of goings-on have us totally intrigued. Are you as fascinated as I am by the wonders of nature? Ever since I was a small child I have been content to rummage around on the forest floor or at the water’s edge, searching for bugs or plants or animal life of any sort. (We have a little cabinet of curios in our cottage where we deposit our most precious finds: a discarded locust’s shell; a papery wasp’s nest; a boldly-patterned turkey feather; a chunk of a turtle’s shell. I’ll get G to document these for you sometime.) Anyway, I think I’ve mentioned the vernal pools before, right? They are small shallow ponds or enormous puddles that form because of the melting snow and heavy rains of early spring, creating marshy areas as seen above. The wonderful thing is that these are breeding grounds for frogs, newts and salamanders!

Here we came across an egg mass! Female amphibians often lay their eggs in a protective jelly-like substance which attaches itself to twigs or other underwater matter.

G and I were careful to tread very gingerly as we began to see that the pools were teeming with critters! Some investigation in the trusty field guide revealed that they were Eastern Newts (Notophthalmus viridescens); judging from the description, the yellow belly especially, these are the aquatic form. They are breeding now and the larvae will hatch in about 3 to 8 weeks. The adults prey voraciously on worms, insects, small crustaceans, amphibian eggs and larvae. (Hopefully not their own!!) Greedy things, they will visit the spawning beds of fish to feast on their eggs; an adult can consume up to 2,000 springtails (teensy hexapods)!

Note the brilliant, speckled underbelly. (FYI: I had carefully washed my hands before leaving the house.)

I tried to resist picking them up, but it was kinda hard.

We also came across this remarkably beautiful, algae-covered turtle shell with vertebrae still attached. Layers of the shell peeled away like some sort of pliable veneer. Very interesting, but a bit too far gone to add to the cabinet of curios.

From afar, many trees still look bereft and winterified but, upon closer inspection, they are all springing to life.

The big brown bunny was out in the yard today. I bet he can’t wait to get at my herbs again! Birds are streaking around madly, the chipmunks have reappeared, and the rhubarb is pushing up already. It’s 80 degrees today! Ah spring, a young man’s thoughts must be turning to love. This old broad? Obsessing about the garden…

We’re eagerly awaiting spring up here in the boonies. Of late we’ve been snowed in, buffeted by gale-force winds, and now deluged with driving rains that have brought waterfalls literally gushing out of the woods. The vernal pools are forming and bits of green glow like sea glass on the forest floor—hardy moss and ferns that have somehow weathered through.

In our own yard, the blush of new life can be seen on the ripening buds of the lilac bush and in the emerging colors of the succulent garden. We have been in the city for the past couple of days where the magnolias are threatening to burst into bloom at any moment. I’m about to have lunch at the newly lauded Colicchio & Sons (3 stars in the Times) and will soon head back to my own kitchen. For now, I’m turning my face to the sun with high hopes for the new season.