From one of the region’s foremost mushroom hunters—Walter E. Sturgeon—comes a long-overdue field guide to finding and identifying the mushrooms and fleshy fungi found in the Appalachian mountains from Canada to Georgia. Edibility and toxicity, habitat, ecology, and detailed diagnostic features of the disparate forms they take throughout their life cycles are all included, enabling the reader to identify species without the use of a microscope or chemicals.
Appalachian Mushrooms is unparalleled in its accuracy and currency, from its detailed photographs to descriptions based on the most advanced classification information available, including recent DNA studies that have upended some mushrooms’ previously accepted taxonomies. Sturgeon celebrates more than 400 species in all their diversity, beauty, and scientific interest, going beyond the expected specimens to include uncommon ones and those that are indigenous to the Appalachian region.
This guide is destined to be an indispensable authority on the subject for everyone from beginning hobbyists to trained experts, throughout Appalachia and beyond.
Walt Sturgeon is a field mycologist with over forty years of experience studying and identifying mushrooms. His photos of mushroom and fungi, some award-winning, can be seen in numerous mushroom field guide publications, three of which he coauthored. One of these, Mushrooms of the Northeast, was awarded the best field guide of 2016 by the National Outdoor Writers Association.
“Walt Sturgeon has studied mushrooms for over forty years and has become one of the great field mycologists of our time.“—Tom Bigelow,
New York Mycological Society Newsletter“This is a much needed book that fills a fungal niche vacant for a long time! It was not written for the taxonomic specialist but for a more general lay audience of mushroom enthusiasts. All of the mushroom clubs in the U.S.A. and Canada better have this book on their bookshelves. Beginners learning mostly fleshy fungi for the first time will find this a welcome addition to their mushroom library. State and national parks and conservation agencies in the Appalachian region should have this book available for sale in their welcome centers. College, university, and public libraries will want to have this book available for the general public to enjoy the biodiversity of fungi. Naturalists, summer campers and hikers, and outdoor enthusiasts who may wish to learn more about the wonderful world of fungi beneath their feet will find this book a good place to start. I highly recommend this book for all the myco-bibliophiles who want to enjoy fungi collecting in the field. I bought it!”—Harold W. Keller,
Journal of the Botanical Research Institute of Texas“Since naming conventions for these fungi have undergone many transitions in recent years, the highly experienced author has included alternate names that help cross-reference names used in older field guides.…There are an astonishing variety of mushrooms found in the Appalachian region, and new species are regularly discovered, or known species identities' challenged. In the end, Sturgeon’s guide offers the curious an enjoyable introduction to a rich and complex realm.”—
CHOICE“A significant contribution … because the photos are the very best I have ever seen in an American field guide, this book will find readers and users well beyond the limits of its geographic range. Many of these mushrooms are not restricted to the Appalachians, and it will be a welcome resource for those outside this area to identify the mushrooms in their own region.”—Gary Lincoff, author of the National Audubon Society’s
Field Guide to North American Mushrooms and president emeritus, North American Mycological Association
“This may well be the most accurate guide I have seen.
Appalachian Mushrooms is unquestionably the work of someone who has spent a lifetime studying and mastering identification of the mushrooms that occur here. It is the most current and up-to-date book on the fungi of Appalachia.”—John Plischke, author of
Good Mushroom Bad Mushroom
