New Mexico Mycological Society - February 1999
February Meeting
     Ruth Bronson will present a basic program on the parts of the mushrooms that are needed to identify a species.
     Our meeting will be at the Natural History Museum on February 2nd at 7:30pm. I realize this falls on Groundhog Day, but members need not bring any stuffed critters to celebrate this event. In case any do show up, a certain member has assured us that they will be shot on sight.
Last Month's Meeting
     Larry Weingarten brought up a couple of subjects at the January Meeting. One was a plan to build some wooden frames for organizing and showing mushrooms at Forays and other opportunities for public display. These will be similar to those used at the 1997 NAMA Conference at Copper Mountain. We will have more information on these in the next month or two.
     Larry also encouraged members to pursue our plan to compile a set of slides of common New Mexico Mushrooms. This can and should be a collective effort. More information about the species lists is oulined below.
Field Trip to Alamosa
     At the last meeting I brought up a suggestion to hold a field trip to the Rakhra Mushroom facility in Alamosa, Colorado. We did this last in March of 1995, and found the visit both enjoyable and informative. Although I have not set a date yet, I suspect we may go again in March and probably on a Saturday. I intend to include as part of this trip a visit to the nearby alligator farm. If any members have suggestions about date or other logistical matters, please contact me. I suspect we will want to work out some carpooling arrangements, and I will do what I can to coördinate that.
Bob Chapman's Talk
     Bob Chapman gave a wonderful talk which consisted of two parts. He had arrived at the meeting with a wheelbarrow full of mushroom books, each of which he introduced and described lovingly. Bob then discussed Amanita variations and identification, illustrated by a nice set of slides.
List of Common Species
     Bob Chapman and Ted Stampfer have put together two lists of mushrooms: 38 gilled and 40 non-gilled. They agreed on these lists for the NMMS slides of "local" mushrooms. They request that members view these lists and comment on possible changes, deletions, or additions. However, if someone wants to add a species, they need to delete another to keep the total number the same. We would like these comments by the next meeting. If anyone has slides which they believe would be suitably representative of any of these species, please let us know.
  • Current proposed list of species
    History of NMMS Officers
         NMMS thanks Pat Brannen for graciously filling in the blanks on the club history page.