Customer Reviews

The Mushroom Hunter's Field Guide

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a nice book to augment a collection, but is not complete. The set of guides written by Smith and his daughter (Weber) do not overlap. This means that you need this book and the edition for the south in order to look up mushrooms in the south. There are no mentions of spore print colors in the individual entries, which makes for a lot of thumbing back and forth between the specific entries and the genus descriptions

I was glad I added this one to my collection and library. As others have pointed out, it certainly is not an all inclusive work by any means, but I did find the photography well done and the book to be helpful IF I use it in conjunction with other works. I cannot stress the "IF" enough. I photograph wild flowers as a hobby but cannot pass up a good shot of any mushrooms I come across in my wonderings. This is a good field guide to carry in the car and it usually gives me enough information to get a good start on identification after the photography work is done and I have time to properly research the photographed subject. I suspect the very, very serious collector or professional would need much more than is offered here, but for my purposes, it works just fine.

This book contains excellent color photos to mach the color tones and size characteristics of the mushrooms in the Midwest. We typically search in the areas south of Lake Superior.

This is the best mushroom book for beginning mushroom hunters in the Lake States, written by a career University of Michigan mycologist who collected and described many new species in the Lake States for 40 years or more.

D.L. Richter, Ph.D.
Mycology/Pathology

I really enjoyed reading the "This is what a mushroom is" introduction chapter. Every mushroom guide feels the need to tell you "this is the cap",etc. This time the author actually taught with clear, friendly wording.
The area of expertise for this guide is for the Northeast to the Northwest, Great Lakes, and into Canada. I've found it useful here in the Southeast on a few occasions. With changing weather climates and patterns, all sorts of things can happen.
I feel the pictures and reference information are detailed and clear. Surely usefull, even in Wisconsin.
Great book made for the hunt, just wear a coat with wide pockets.

As previously indicated, this book is very helpful for those looking to 'treasure hunt' in Michigan/Great Lakes states. For being 30+ years old, the quality is fine and I wouldn't hesistate to purchase again...it would be nice to update with high-resolution digital photos, and perhaps there is another book out there that has that, but for my purposes, it's worth it.

The book is overflowing with info, but I wish it was layed-out a little more concisely!

This book is a great resource, although a little technical for a beginning mushroom hunter.

This is a big, fairly technical book which is NOT appropriate for a novice 'shroom seeker. It would be great for someone who already knows what he is seeing, but for those of us who need pictures for identification it is too textbook-like.

ordered book, got book, little info. didn't realize it was copyright 1958 and an old library book, that was thrown out (I hope) because of it's age. buyer beware.