Fungus Fair

The Fungus Fair is held each year in January in Santa Cruz at the Louden Nelson Community Center. The Fair is sponsored in association with the Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History. The weekend-long event features hundreds of species of local fungi presented in a unique fashion, and draws 2000 plus visitors each year. The Fair showcases speakers, cooking demonstrations, a special Kids' Room, and a taxonomy panel for identification of fungi. Many books and mushroom-related items are available for sale, as are wild mushroom delicacies.

Did you know that without fungus, we’d have no bread, cheese, beer, or wine?  Or that anti-cholesterol medicine was developed from mushrooms?  Come to the Santa Cruz Fungus Fair to learn all there is to know about the fascinating world of mushrooms. This unique Santa Cruz tradition features two days of fantastic fungus fun for the whole family. Bring the kids and stroll through a re-created woodland forest displaying hundreds of wild mushrooms; the Fungus Fair also features a special room full of hands-on activities for the kids, including fungus exploration tables, clay mushroom building, face painting, and more!

Highlighted this year are top chefs and epicures Todd Spanier (King of Mushrooms) and Massimo Caporale (Gelato Massimo) who will team up for an amazing cooking demonstration to thrill your palate.  Sean Baker of Gabriella Café, which has been proclaimed by Sunset Magazine as the “most romantic spot in Santa Cruz,” will be joining the Fungus Fair this year to demonstrate the fantastic flavors conveyed from great mushroom dishes.  Other highlights include mushroom identification experts, a special panel on mushroom poisonings, and basics on mushroom identification in our popular Mushrooms 101 class.   Learn about medicinal properties of mushrooms from renowned herbalist Chris Hobbs, or ask an expert to identify the mushroom from your back yard

The next Fungus Fair will be held January 10-11, 2009 from 10:Am to 5 PM each day! General Information: (831) 420-6115

Member discount – Current Fungus Federation and Museum Association members receive a $1 discount on the $7 admission at the door. Seniors & Students $5, Kids under 12 Free.
NEW! Special Double-day Pass: General $12, Museum and Federation members $10
More parking on Center Street, near the Police Station

Those who volunteer 2 hours or more in setup or during the fair are admitted free.

Collecting for the Fair

Everyone is encouraged to collect specimens for the fair. Please bring your collections to any of the locations listed below, prior to the fair weekend for identification and display setup.

MUSHROOM COLLECTING FORAYS:

Ken Sommers will be coordinating the collecting forays this year. He can be reached by phone at 831 425-4509.

The collecting trips begin on Sunday, January 4th and will continue every day through Wednesday the 7th. We urge you to join those collecting trips, which will start daily at 9 AM on the street outside Harvey West Scout House where we hold our regular meetings. Please gather at 8:45 AM for car pooling. These trips will be for collecting only and will not include any ID sessions. Please bring bring your baskets, collecting equipment, wax paper, paper bags or wax paper sandwich bags in which to collect the mushrooms. Bring water and a snack because we will probably hunt till around till noon. As always these forays are on rain or shine, so dress appropriately. These trips are for collecting only and will not include any ID sessions.

Tentative foray destination locations:
Sun. Jan 4 - Rip Van Winkle Preserve in Pacific Grove
Mon. Jan 5 - UCSC's Marshall Fields
Tues. Jan 6- UCSC's Marshall Fields
Wed. Jan 7- Swanton Road

We also urge you to collect on your own and bring the mushrooms either to the collecting parties meeting at Harvey West Scout House, to the Santa Cruz City Museum of Natural History on East Cliff Drive, or to Louden Nelson Center during the setup period. After hours collections may be left at the Museum in the stairwell around the left side of the building as you’re facing the front door. After Wednesday, January 7, bring any additional collections to Louden Nelson Center after noon, but before Friday at noon.

Field Note Recording

Please take field notes when collecting specimens for the fair. Taking Field Notes When Collecting Fungi for Study Is Easier Than You Think.

When out on FFSC forays we’ve observed many different collecting methods. These range from simply loading all mushrooms into a bag or basket in a jumbled mass to careful segregation of collections and protection of small or delicate species. Some people take notes, others don’t.

When collecting for this year’s Fungus Fair we ask that you be among the latter. We also ask that you take notes in the form of a voucher slip. First you may ask, “What is a voucher slip?” A voucher slip is a small form that has areas to enter information about the fungus you are collecting. This information is focused on where and when the fungus is found and can be as simple as the foray location, date and fungus name. This is of limited use if you do not know the name of your fungus. Other useful information found on a voucher slip includes; habitat, growth habit, odor when fresh, staining reactions and any other information that will help in identifying an unknown fungus using a set of keys.

Get the FFSC voucher slip here: PDF version or Excel version. Print up several of the slips and try them this year, for the fair and other forays. Modify them as you wish to meet your collecting and identification needs;the Excel version can be edited. Additional notes may be written on the back of the slip.

Let’s face it, when we collect many species of fungi for study it can  sometimes be challenging to recall if a collection was growing with live oak or tanoak, pine or Douglas fir. The voucher slip is a memory aid, is quick to fill out and drop into the collecting baggie. This is especially helpful when collecting for the Fungus Fair since many of the fungi will be identified by someone other than the collector.

A note on collecting for identification, remember to always collect the entire fruit body, this may require digging down several inches (sometimes over a foot) in order to get the entire base of a fungus like Caulorhiza umbonata, the redwood rooter, which can have a rooting base that extends a foot or more into the ground. Also collect a range of ages, from young buttons to mature fruit bodies, you can leave the rotters. Keep your collections separate, in waxed or paper bags, never use plastic bags as they accelerate ageing and decomposition. If you are not sure about the vegetative habitat description, then, collecting a few pieces of ground leaf litter around the specimen to add to your sample bag will help later identification of the habitat of your collection.

For more information on field notes and macroscopic features to note see Arora, Mushrooms Demystified, 1986, pp. 13-19.

Duff Collection

We need your Duff! This season’s fair is scheduled for January 11–12. And we need dry duff for the displays. Why dry? Because it’s easier to handle. If you have access to pine, fir, redwood, oak, or madrone duff, the Fair committee would appreciate your collecting a large trash bag full. Please leave obvious tanoak or bay laurel material in the woods; we don’t want to spread a lot of Sudden Oak Death around. Phil Carpenter has once again agreed to serve as duff collecing point. You can drop off a bag at his house, or bring it to Louden Nelson Wednesday, January 7th at noon. Thanks!

Phil Carpenter
6447 Hidden Oaks Drive
Aptos, CA 95003
EMAIL
831 684-2074

Fungus Fair Activities

Display Area:

Mushrooms are artistically displayed in a recreation of natural habitat with identification tags providing informatiion about each species. We typically have hundreds of species on display each year.

Identification Tables:

Bring in your mushrooms that you find, for identicication by our mushroom experts.

Kids' Room: Story telling, clay mushroom building, face painting, fabric dyeing.

For a shedule of events and speakers Click Here.

Membership Volunteers Needed:

Volunteers are needed to assist with membership signup and renewals. All volunteer positions are for 1-2 hours help. Free admissison to the fair for all membership volunteers. Contact EMAIL

More Information and Volunteer for Setup and Takedown

FAIR CHAIR
Marjorie Young will provide organizational support for the whole operation as this year’s Fair Chair. She can be reached at 831 426-1315 or EMAIL

VOLUNTEERS
Debbie Johnson will be in charge of the volunteer staff and will keep track of those of you who put in two hours or more of volunteer time. This will get you free admission to the Fair. Contact her if you have any questions about signing up, or if you want help deciding what would be most fun for you. contact her at 831 459-9530 or EMAIL.

Weds, Jan 7: Noon - 9:30 PM
• Table setup, building island, greens on tables, making baskets for display
Thurs, Jan 8: 10:00 AM - 9:30 PM
• Making lots of baskets for display – fungal flower arrangements!
Fri, Jan 9: 10:00 AM - 4:00 PM
• Basketmaking, setup of vendor rooms, stores, Mushroom 101 room and reception.
Sun, Jan 11: 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM
• Cleanup. Five days to make, two hours to go away. With dinner. Amazing!


If your schedule is unpredictable, just show up when you can. Dress warmly, as the room is kept cool for the mushrooms!

- Directions to the Louden Nelson Community Center -