Aubinger Lohe

We went to the woods in Aubinger Lohe yesterday. The kids and I have never been exposed to so much nature before we moved here, I especially. The fresh air, the stillness, the cooler temperature, the crackling of the branches, the rustling of the leaves.

We set off to the woods with one thing in mind - to educate ourselves on wild mushrooms. Christophe says a lot of delicious wild mushrooms grow in abundance, amidst many more poisonous wild ones. To help us identify the edible ones from the ones that will cause us hallucinations when eaten, we brought two mushroom reference books with us.

The search for mushrooms begins...

I found this! Maronen Röhrling or Boletus badius. The biggest and confirmed edible one of our search!

And these had to be discarded because we weren't sure if we could eat them!

On our way back, we pass by several small hills of black soil. These are mole hills!

The searching of the mushrooms isn't difficult, even though we have to bend our backs and look closely. What challenges us is to match the mushrooms to those illustrated in the books.

It might sound like a boring activity. But when Bart says, "plucking mushrooms is so fun", I know then this is the beginning of our wild mushroom educational journey. The mushroom season will soon be over, but we have already planned for more excursions to the woods when spring arrives.