The reason left behind

Leaves are collecting along the edges of old trails. Ferns that stood waist high a month ago are folding toward the ground. The mornings smell different, the sunlight comes through the trees at a lower angle, and places that felt crowded with green all summer are slowly opening back up.

This is the time of year we spend a lot of time in the woods. There are grouse to hunt, deer stands to check and cold little trout streams that somehow look better with yellow leaves floating through the bends. We usually have a reason for being out there, and lately we have gotten into the habit of keeping an eye out for something else along the way.

I am far from an expert at it. There are a handful I know well enough to be comfortable with, a few more I am learning, and a whole lot that I leave alone. The kids are getting pretty good at spotting them, though. Sometimes I think they are looking for them more than whatever it was we walked into the woods for in the first place.

One of them will get a few steps off the trail and holler for me to come look.

By the time I get there, everyone is usually standing around some little mushroom sticking out of the leaves.

“Can we eat this one?”

Sometimes they have one. Other times I turn it over, look underneath it, look at the stem and still have no idea. It goes back where they found it and we keep walking.

But they remember the ones we do know.

That has been fun to watch. The first few times, every mushroom was just a mushroom. Now they are starting to notice differences before I say anything. They look underneath. They notice what kind of tree it is growing near, whether it came out of the dirt or an old piece of wood. They will find one they recognize and come running back down the trail with the kind of excitement usually reserved for a fish on the end of a line.

I probably walked past thousands of them when I was their age.

I still walk past plenty.

Sometimes it takes a while but once you see a few, mushrooms seem to turn up everywhere. Along a trout stream they grow beside old logs, on the damp banks and in the moss just a few steps from the water. Some are bright enough that you wonder how you ever missed them. Others nearly disappear into the leaves.

I have gotten into the habit of keeping a plastic bag stuffed into my waders. It weighs nothing and takes up almost no room, and most days it comes home folded up exactly the way it went in. But every once in a while we find something worth keeping.

Then the bag starts filling up as we work our way along the stream.

A few mushrooms from one bend. Maybe another farther upstream. The bag gets tucked back into my waders and we keep fishing.

The water is cold by then. Leaves catch in the little pockets behind rocks and collect against logs. The boys work ahead of me, fishing the deeper holes and checking the bank whenever something catches their eye.

Sometimes the trout cooperate too.

I carry a small grate in my backpack quite a bit, along with a little skillet. Neither takes up much room, but together they are just enough to cook a meal along the stream.

We find a dry spot and gather some wood. The plastic bag comes out of my waders while a few brook trout are cleaned at the water’s edge. Once the fire gets going, the grate goes over the top and the trout cook right over the open flame.

The little skillet sits beside them with the mushrooms and some butter. Before long they start to shrink and brown around the edges. The trout skin begins to crisp. The kids hover close, and somebody pokes at the fire with a stick even though I have probably told them three times to leave it alone.

Smoke gets in your eyes. A little ash probably ends up on dinner.

Nobody cares.

We eat right there beside the stream while the fire settles into the coals. By the time we are done, the light is usually disappearing from the woods. Fall evenings don’t give much warning.

We clean up, and the little skillet and grate go back into the pack. I fold the empty plastic bag and stuff it back into my waders.

On the walk out, we still look.

There are mushrooms we don’t pick. Some are too small, some we aren’t sure about, and a few we leave knowing exactly where they are.

This time of year it’s easy to tell yourself you’ll get back to a place and then realize a week has gone by. Mushrooms don’t give you that kind of time. We know they won’t be good for long, and maybe the best reason for coming back is the one you leave behind.