I spent an average of three hours a day gathering, and with a recent cool spell many mushrooms had popped. There were these guys which I didn't even bother with because there weren't enough to care about:
Maybe a Lacaria
And plenty of Turkey Tails and False Turkey Tails:
And Honeys (Armillaria mellea) which I left:
And these pretty Mycenas:
But of course the best was the most unexpected because of the dryness, and it was these perfectly young oysters:
The Honeys I wanted to confirm the ID since I had not seen these before in person, so I did spore print. The spore can either be white or if its one of the lookalikes (jackolantern) then the spores will be cream. To my eye there's no confusing the two but just in case...and the spores were white, so Honey. But I also wanted to show how I spore print when the options are lighter colors - I put half on a white paper and half on something darker.
Also found some milkweed - too late for these guys but I know where to get the next year!
You already know about my pawpaw success
and because I found some super loaded bushes I gathered Spicebush berries even though I may have enough. I'm working on a new use - making a fermented drink from them.
All of this was gathered on private land in the Mark Twain National Forest. I had been gathering chanterelles in the area but I had never dug this deep on the land before. I already told my sous chef that he's coming with us next year and we'll go two weeks earlier when even more will be prime for picking.
Later that day, however, despite my final words to Tyler being, "Watch out for deer. They're really thick in this area at dusk."
Which led me to decide to go to the shooting range the next morning.