Textbook Specimen

Makeup Day 9: With my eye on the goal of Pinnacle Peak saddle, I walked right past this field-guide specimen of Amanita muscaria and only noticed it as I came down the last few steps of the trail before reaching the Stevens Canyon Road. Only once before have I found such a picture-perfect example, and that one fostered the name my husband and I gave to his grandparents' ranch when we inherited it. "Toadstool Acres" was what we called our place, and the photos I took during the late autumn before we moved in became the centerpiece of our Christmas cards that year. Nowadays, I laughingly call this species the "Mario mushroom," and it is easily one of the most widely recognized fungi in the world. The old hippies among my readers will remember it by its reputation as a hallucinogen, a detail which led quite a few members of that era to experiment with it despite the very high potential for incurring liver damage from ingesting the alkaloids. Although not deadly in the short term like its cousin, Amanita phalloides, this pretty little toadstool will get you in the end.