Boston Flora

Tag: Mushrooms

  • Thursdays, October 9 and 15, 5:30 pm – 7:30 pm – Mushrooms of the Forest in Dry Brush Watercolor, Online

    This Berkshire Botanical Garden online workshop will focus on using dry brush watercolor to replicate the colors and the form of mushrooms. “Dry brush” refers to the art of using only a small amount of paint to damp a brush. Learn the basics of the technique: color mixing and layering, working from light to dark, adding fine detail and using a dry brush with the “skin” of dried paint on the palette. This two-session class on October 9 and 15 from 5:30 – 7:30 pm led by botanical artist Anastasia Traina will include live instructional time and group critique. Attendees will be provided with a photograph and an outline of the same mushroom to work from throughout the class. These materials will be provided post-registration along with a required material list. 

    Anastasia Traina is a member of SAG, WGA, The Dramatists Guild, The American Society of Botanical Artists, the Tri-State Botanical Artists of NYBG, the SBA and Circle East. Ms. Traina is a graduate with honors from the NYBG botanical art degree program. She lives in upstate New York with her husband, dog, two rabbits and her 40,000 bees.

  • Sunday, September 20, 10:30 am – Magnificent Mushrooms Botanical Illustration

    Sunday, September 20, 10:30 am – Magnificent Mushrooms Botanical Illustration

    Explore the multitude of mushrooms popping up in the woods at Tower Hill on September 20 at 10:30 am. This program will be held under our open sided outdoor canopy tent. Group size will not exceed current state restrictions. Sketch as you see them, then snap a photo with your phone and add color with colored pencils while sitting at a table under the activities tent. Learn about showing texture and shading.

    Instructor Carol Schwartz graduated from the Kansas City Art Institute, attending her senior year at Rhode Island School of Design. She earned her MFA in Illustration from the University of Hartford, Connecticut in 2014. Her education equipped her to be diverse and adaptable, with work appearing in 60 picture books and countless magazines, newspapers and advertisements.

    $30 for Tower Hill members, $40 for nonmembers. Register at https://towerhillbg.thankyou4caring.org/pages/event-registration-form—magnificent-mushrooms

  • Tuesday, July 28, 10:00 am – 11:30 am – Medicinal Mushrooms: Fungi for a Healthy Body, Mind, and Planet

    Find out how mushrooms can benefit your body and the planet in this online New York Botanical Garden course on July 28 from 10 – 11:30 am. Emerging research suggests that mushrooms maybe beneficial for brain and nerve health. Discover the properties of different species and learn where medicinal mushrooms occur locally. We’ll also discuss how fungi have been used to clean up toxins in the environment by filtering water and removing heavy metals from soil. Catskill Fungi owner and mycology expert John Michelotti will demo how to make a mushroom extract that you can use to make your own tinctures. NYBG members $65, nonmembers $69. Register at www.nybg.org

  • Thursday, May 21, 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm – Psychedelic Mushrooms Webinar

    Discover the power, the allure, and the science of psychedelic mushrooms during an online class sponsored by the New York Botanical Garden on May 21 from 6:30 – 8:30 pm. Food journalist and former president of the New York Mycological Society, Eugenia Bone, author of Mycophilia, will discuss the biology of these potent fungi, their cultural history, and contemporary use and regulation in the U.S., as well as the efforts underway to decriminalize and utilize them in therapeutic practice. NYBG members $45, nonmembers $55. Register at www.nybg.org.

  • Sunday, April 5, 1:00 pm – 3:00 pm – Cultivating Mushrooms at Home: Winecaps, Oysters, and Shiitakes – Postponed

    Explore growing your own mushrooms in a class at Berkshire Botanical Garden, 5 West Stockbridge Road in Stockbridge on Sunday, April 5 from 1 – 3, with Willy Crosby. Willie Crosby is the owner of Fungi Ally, a mushroom company located in Montague, MA, focusing on mushroom research, education, and spawn production. Willie has received 6 research and education grants over the last 5 years to study and educate the public on mushrooms. Willie aims to create a world of balance and connection through revealing the power of mushrooms.

    Learn the lifecycle of mushrooms and the important ecological role that fungi fill. Focus on several methods of cultivating mushrooms.  Participants will leave with the tools and knowledge to start cultivating mushrooms at home and will be given their own inoculated mushroom log.

    This program is currently accepting names for a wait list.  Call 413-298-3926.  Image from www.ruralaction.org.

  • Saturday, October 26, 9:30 am – 12:00 noon – The Art and Science of Mushrooms

    Learn about the science of mushrooms through observations of local fungi, and then try your hand at capturing different mushroom types. Artist and educator, Erica Beade, will introduce techniques for achieving more accuracy, volume, and texture in drawings, while Harvard scientist James Mitchell will provide an overview of local mushrooms based on specimens in hand. This Harvard Museum of Natural History program takes place Saturday, October 26 from 9:30 – 12 at the Museum at 26 Oxford Street in Cambridge. $55 Museum members/$60 nonmembers Click here: Advance registration required.

  • Saturday, April 13, 10:00 am – 12:00 noon – Mushroom Cultivation Workshop

    Growing edible mushrooms on oak logs is an easy and environmentally friendly method. Join Polly Hill Arboretum Horticulturist Oliver Osnoss on April 13 from 10 – 12 for a hands-on workshop inoculating locally sourced oak logs with shiitake (Lentinula edodes) mushroom spawn. Learn about the biology and process of mushroom cultivation for each of these two species. Bring home your own inoculated log and instructions for caring for your crop. Pack a lunch.

    $65/$50 for PHA members. Pre-registration is required. Call 508-693-9426 to sign up.

  • Saturday, October 27, 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm – Fabulous Fungus Fair

    Saturday, October 27, 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm – Fabulous Fungus Fair

    Explore the wondrous world of fungi on Saturday, October 27 from 2 – 4 at the Harvard Museum of Natural History on Oxford Street in Cambridge. Join Harvard students for a closer look at the mushrooms, yeasts, and molds found in gardens, forests, labs—even in our own refrigerators. This is an opportunity to investigate museum collections and participate in hands-on activities led by Harvard students. Regular museum admission rates apply. Free parking is available at the 52 Oxford Street Garage.

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  • Saturday, June 2, 10:00 am – 1:00 pm – Gardening with Mushrooms

    Join Alex Dorr of Fungi Ally at Berkshire Botanical Garden on June 2 from 10 – 1 for this hands-on workshop to turn your garden into an arena of decomposition and mushroom production! Gain the tools and knowledge to transform agricultural waste to grow your own food and medicine for your family and community. We will work with tree mushrooms in particular: wine caps, almond portobellos, and oysters. Participants will become familiar with techniques of cultivating these mushrooms for food, medicine, or mycoremediation purposes. This workshop will include building a wood- chip bed of wine cap mushrooms (Go home with myceliated chips to start your bed own mushroom bed), adding Almond Portobellos to your garden via compost, and growing oyster mushrooms in mulch. We will also discuss transferring and expanding these mushrooms without buying spawn, and using Wine Cap mushrooms in mycoremediation applications.

    Alex Dorr is the lab manager, spawn producer, and education coordinator for Fungi Ally. Fungi Ally’s goal is to connect people with the wonderful world of fungi. Author of the published book Mycoremediation Handbook: Grassroots Guide to Growing Mushrooms and Cleaning up Toxic Waste with Fungi. Working with various other projects including Corenewal, a 501c3 non profit organization in Ecuador cleaning up oil spills and a mycoremediation team based in the USA consulting big industries and doing research. Alex has certifications including Master Soils and Fungi certification, Clean room techniques, and commercial mushroom spawn certification. He has taught mushroom workshops all around the country for years! Dedicated to connecting people with the healing abundance that fungi provides!

    Advance registration is highly recommended, but walk-ins are always welcome, space permitting. BBG members $45, nonmembers $55. Register at https://www.berkshirebotanical.org/events/gardening-mushrooms

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  • Sunday, April 8, 10:00 am – 12:00 noon – Growing Shiitake Mushrooms

    Rachel Brinkman has been growing mushrooms for several years at the Arnold Arboretum and in the past has worked with Cornell University’s Cooperative Extension, teaching woodlot owners how they can farm their own gourmet mushrooms. All that is needed is a bit of shade and some inoculated logs to construct a crib that can produce a variety of mushroom types. On Sunday, April 8 at 10 am in the Hunnewell Building Garage, Rachel will share what she has learned and guide you through the process of drilling logs, inoculating them with spawn, and then sealing them with wax. She will discuss care for a bountiful crop. Each participant will go home with an Arboretum-grown shiitake-inoculated log readied for mushroom production. Fee $45 Arboretum member; $58 nonmember. Register at http://my.arboretum.harvard.edu or call 617-384-5277.

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