Most notably, the caps of wood ear mushrooms always face downward, like an umbrella. Cup mushrooms, as their name suggests, have caps that curve upwards\u2013like a cup.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nWhat\u2019s more, wood ear mushrooms have a much more flexible, rubbery, jelly-like texture than cup mushrooms. The caps bend easily and may feel soft or spongy between your fingers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meanwhile, cup mushrooms have a much more firm texture, like typical mushrooms. They may appear gelatinous, but they will feel much stronger and will not bend as easily as wood ear mushrooms\u2013in fact, they would be more likely to bruise or break under pressure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you want to make certain of your mushroom\u2019s identity, take a spore print. As mentioned above, wood ears have white to yellowish spores that appear roughly sausage-shaped when you\u2019re looking at them under a microscope. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nWood ears are easy to identify because of their crinkly ear-shaped appearance and jelly-like texture. That said, if you\u2019ve never foraged for mushrooms before or you aren\u2019t completely sure of the identification, it may be best to have your harvest checked by a more experienced or professional forager before you eat them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Conclusion<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Wood ear mushrooms are unique mushrooms that can be found growing in temperate and subtropical forests worldwide, though they are most commonly found in Asia and North America. These mushrooms grow in mild, humid parts of the year on dead and decaying wood, especially elder, beech, and ash.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
If you\u2019re getting into the world of wild mushroom foraging, you may be amazed at just how many types of mushrooms there are. One that may have your attention is the wood ear mushroom, which has a unique appearance and texture when compared with other fungi. So, you may be wondering, where do wood ear … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":12168,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[157],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.forestwildlife.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12162"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.forestwildlife.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.forestwildlife.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.forestwildlife.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.forestwildlife.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12162"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.forestwildlife.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12162\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12772,"href":"https:\/\/www.forestwildlife.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12162\/revisions\/12772"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.forestwildlife.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12168"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.forestwildlife.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.forestwildlife.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.forestwildlife.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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