Thoroughly spraying all over with insect repellent, Edyth Lammey prepared herself for the hunt.
Lammey’s been hunting this springtime quarry, armed with only a bag, for more than 70 years. Just because what she hunts doesn’t move, because it doesn’t have feet, doesn’t mean the chase is easy. Just like big game, hunting morel mushrooms takes knowledge, experience, and luck.
She added the liberal application of insect repellent to her routine three years ago, after she contracted Rocky Mountain Spotted fever from a tick bite.
But, that tick bite doesn’t deter her zest for the outdoors.
“In Iowa, they’re thick,” Lammey said, recalling her childhood foraging for mushrooms. “We used to look for them when we went to get the cows.”
Lammey and her husband moved to the Garfield area years ago.
“They’re ripe for a couple of weeks in the spring,” she said.
“They’re usually along the edges of the banks, not down in the valley.
“It’s a little like men going deer hunting in the fall ... it doesn’t matter if you get a deer, it’s just about being out there.” She smiled, as she gingerly picked her way through tangled undergrowth along the rocky ridge. “I think deer hunters just like being out there whether they get a deer or not.”
As she moved along, eyes scanning the leaf-covered ground, she pointed out various wildflowers.
Using a walking stick to steady herself, Lammey crisscrossed the ridge, foraging for the whitish to light brown-colored mushrooms, occasionally using her walking stick to push aside grass and brush.
Just like so often happens on the deer hunt she suggested, success is elusive.
“It’s been too dry,” she muses. Moments later she laughingly recalls times she’s taken her grandsons with her on the hunt. She said they quickly grow bored of the search.
As her eyes scan the ground, her gaze freezes. Success: “There’s one.”
As she stoops to harvest the morel, she quietly describes the process. Pinch it off at the ground level. Leave the root.”
Putting the find in a bag, she continues the search.
Soon there’s another and another. Nearly a dozen are bagged. But Lammey remembers finding twice that many in previous years.
Explaining the preparation process, she says the morels should be sliced lengthwise, soaked in salt water, then covered with flour and lightly fried in oil or margarine.
“Be careful not to cook too long - the flavor is very delicate.”
Lammey happily notes that one of her sons, who lives in Missouri, will visit soon and go on a morel search with her, shortly before the morel season ends.
With the end of season, whether it’s deer hunting or morel hunting, memory of past hunts and visions of future hunts sustains the hunter. Certainly next year come late March and early April, Lammey will be out in the woods, walking her secret hunting spot, eyes on the ground, looking for her elusive quarry.
News, Pages 1 on 04/20/2011