Notes: Sometimes it seems that all the forces of the universe are working against me in the accomplishment of a goal. The first time I collected this mushroom it rotted before it dried because I tried to dry the whole giant mushroom in one piece. Losing the mushroom was very frustrating, because I had gone to considerable lengths to collect the specimen, and I endured a three hour drive home with that thing stinking up my car. The aroma becomes nauseating after a while.
Not wishing to admit defeat, I drove back to West Virginia to get another one, and this time I cut a few slices to bring home and dry instead of taking the whole mushroom. However, even the small pieces stunk so bad that I did not want to leave them in my car for very long, so every time I stopped at a new place to hunt mushrooms, I left the bag of stink-bomb Amanita pieces on the ground beside my car and whenever I was ready to move on I’d pick it up and take it with me.
That evening, about two hours into the drive home, I was feeling pretty good about the hunt, looking forward to bed, and enjoying the fruity scent of the large basket of chanterelles riding shotgun next to me. Suddenly I realized my car did not stink! The stink-bomb Amanita was two hours behind me in the parking lot at Babcock State Park; I probably ran over it with my front tire on the way out. A fitting end to a foul mushroom!
The upshot is I don’t have an herbarium specimen.
But here are some more photos.
