It is generally accepted that the ideal time for picking mushrooms is summer and autumn. This is justified by the appearance of a large mushroom abundance in this season. More experienced mushroom pickers have already identified in advance, so to speak, fruitful places in the forests.
What mushrooms are common in the forests of the Leningrad region
They form the following list:
- Oil. These mushrooms have distinctive features in the form of an oily hat. Its skin comes off easily during cleaning.
- Boletus. This species grows most often along the edge of forest roads and has a hat with a diameter of about 15 cm. Its color changes periodically, in particular, it can be either light gray or brown.
- Aspen mushrooms. They can be found in the forest, as a rule, from the second half of June until October. They grow mostly in large groups. The hat has the shape of a cap and is bright red or gray, or orange, or white.
- Porcini mushrooms in the Leningrad region are one of the most delicious and beautiful representatives of the mushroom world. They may have veryimpressive dimensions - up to 50 cm in diameter and up to 25 cm high.
- Honey mushrooms. These mushrooms appear mainly in the last decade of August and grow until the end of autumn. They can be found on stumps, roots and fallen tree trunks of both deciduous and coniferous species. Hats are usually small in size and light yellow in color, have a flat or slightly concave shape.
- Mokhoviki. They are found singly or in small groups in coniferous or deciduous forests. These mushrooms can be found at the very beginning of summer and harvested until the end of autumn.
Where there are a lot of mushrooms in the Leningrad region
Their very significant number is observed in the village of Sosnovo, located in the central part of the forest, in which there are mainly coniferous trees. There you can find various types of mushrooms, but the most common are red and yellow russula, black milk mushrooms, bitters and chanterelles. Boletus and porcini mushrooms in the Leningrad region can also be found if the season turned out to be rainy. You can get to this village from St. Petersburg by train, which departs from the Finnish Station.
Also popular among avid mushroom pickers is the Berngardovka railway station, or rather its surrounding forests.
If you want to know where there are a lot of mushrooms in the Leningrad region, then you should pay attention to such a village in coniferous forests as Snegirevka. There are a lot of chanterelles, flywheels, russula,podgruzdkov, and less often and boletus with porcini mushrooms. To get to it, you first have to take the train to the previously mentioned village of Sosnovo, and then by bus to the right place.
Not far from the Vuoksa River, there is another mushroom village called Losevo. There is also an electric train from the Finnish railway station to it. Here grow boletus, porcini mushrooms, boletus, and if the year is fruitful, then chanterelles.
Porcini mushrooms in the Leningrad region (the village of Stekolny) are in abundance almost every year of the corresponding season. However, the main difficulty is how to get there. These places can only be reached by car.
What you need to know about mushrooms
- The first thing to remember for those who intend to engage in fruitful “silent hunting” is that mushrooms most often grow in groups, so you should take a closer look near an already found specimen.
- Second point - do not collect suspicious, rotten or unfamiliar mushrooms.
- And thirdly, they should be put in a basket or a basket, since they are best able to provide the air circulation required for the preservation of mushrooms.
When is the best time to go to the forest
The season of mushrooms in the Leningrad region fits in the period from early summer to mid-autumn. In September, autumn mushrooms replaced the summer harvest. Now in the forest, their connoisseurs will have access to glades of honey agaric, pigs, fluffs, whites, birch boletus, podgruzdkov, etc.
Unfortunately, October is the last month of mushroomof the season, however, late mushrooms, last waves, whites and saffron milk can still please all their fans.
What can picking mushrooms in the Leningrad region lead to by unprepared amateurs
According to the available official data, on September 10, 2014 in the intensive care unit of the toxicology department of the Research Institute of Emergency Medicine named after. Dzhanelidze turned out to be three Petersburgers who were poisoned by poisonous mushrooms collected in the Vsevolozhsk and Tosnensky districts of the Leningrad region.
According to Oleg Kuznetsov, the head of the above-mentioned department, it is very difficult to accurately determine the type of fungus that caused the poisoning. Presumably, it could be pale grebe (the most poisonous mushroom).
This is the sixth case of poisoning since the beginning of the "silent hunting" season in St. Petersburg. In August, the first victims arrived - one woman and two men. To date, two patients have been transferred from intensive care, and one victim is still in serious condition, according to the same head.
Thus, it should be borne in mind that in the Leningrad region "mushrooms went" not only edible, but also poisonous. It is necessary to carefully approach the issue of choosing a specimen suitable for eating.
What mushrooms were born at the beginning of this season in the Leningrad region
Summer representatives, who took over from the May lines and morels, were the first mushrooms. You could find them on logs, rotten and hardwood stumps. Mushrooms of the Leningrad region in June, based on their quantitative component, were represented mainly by honey mushrooms.
Also in the first month of summer one could meet the so-called spike mushrooms. This name is not scientific, but folk. Since ancient times, it has been noticed that the most popular mushrooms begin to appear in hay and rye heading. Hence their name came from - haymakers or spikelets.
Their official name is boletus, boletus, porcini mushrooms and the "mushroom king" - boletus. They are, without exaggeration, the main goal of true mushroom pickers. In this regard, there is a belief: until the first white mushroom is found, the season is not considered open.
What are porcini mushrooms and where are they found
They have such a name due to the fact that the tubular layer of the lower surface of their cap, mainly in young representatives, remains white even after drying, unlike other mushrooms of this family, in which it turns black.
One of the parameters of their value is the durability of the aroma, which is preserved in any kind of processing and in any dish. In terms of taste and nutritional properties, the content of vitamins, it is the porcini mushroom that occupies a leading position among all its other colleagues. It belongs to the 1st category and is used for food both fresh and dried, s alted and pickled.
It contains antibiotics that inhibit Koch's wand. Alsothere is official evidence that porcini mushrooms also contain substances that can overcome a number of tumors.
They are most often concentrated in a pine forest. Based on many years of experience of knowledgeable mushroom pickers, their season begins in the last decade of August and stretches to about 10 days. After the specified period, porcini mushrooms can still be found, but only in small quantities, about ten things.
Porcini mushrooms in the Leningrad region mainly live in places such as Kirillovskoye, Yappilya, Mesteryarvi, Zakhodskoye, Gavrilovo, Tarasovskoye, Alekhovshchina and the landfill near Luga.
Distinctive features of the pale grebe
Inexperienced mushroom pickers quite often mistake it for champignon or green russula. Therefore, it is worth highlighting three main differences between them:
- The pale toadstool always has a thickening at the bottom of the stem, but the above mushrooms do not.
- Her plates on the hat on the inside are absolutely white, and on the champignon they are pink.
- The leg of the pale toadstool has a membranous ring located slightly below the cap.
It is worth acquiring a rule: "We collect mushrooms in the Leningrad region and always remember these above differences, and if in doubt, it is better not to take this specimen!"
Where to look for boletus in the Leningrad region
According to experienced mushroom pickers, they love places such as swamps, as well as areas where a large number of birches grow. Even if they are in the middle of a coniferous forest, near themboletus grows necessarily. These mushrooms appear at the very beginning of summer and abound until the end of the season.
If the question arises of where there are a lot of mushrooms in the Leningrad region, in particular boletus mushrooms, then we can safely voice such places as Kirillovskoye, the road to Kamenka and the surrounding areas of the village of Yagodnoye. Moreover, the mushrooms in these places underwent laboratory tests, the results of which revealed ten times fewer harmful substances than the norm.
Is the Leningrad region rich in aspen mushrooms
Among the tubular variety, after the previously considered porcini mushroom, the boletus occupies an honorable second place, based on the criterion of nutritional value (second category). It is consumed both boiled and fried, pickled and dried. It is recognized as the fastest growing mushroom.
These mushrooms in the Leningrad region are as common as boletus. They are the most commonly seen and recognizable edible mushrooms. Their main advantage is that aspen mushrooms cannot be confused with any other mushroom, including poisonous ones. Nevertheless, it is better not to collect flabby specimens, because they will rot in the basket.
According to many years of information from experienced mushroom pickers, it is possible to single out places where there are a lot of mushrooms in the Leningrad Region, namely boletus. These include: Mshinskaya, Kannelyarvi, Sosnovo, Kuznechnoye, Vyritsa, Roshchino, Gorky, Priozersk and Losevo.
