Foul Odor Caps

I found these mushrooms on a shady trail, but well before I could see them I smelled their foul odor. The fungi clearly means to attract flies since many of them swarmed around a cluster.

Some of the over ripe caps appeared to be melting as they decayed. The decaying process possibly serves to smell stronger and attract more flies! Possible spore spreaders? Yes.

Maybe it was because they had already been out there for a while, but all the caps had at least some kind of mold.

Boletus in Summer

Boletus abound in the rainy summer months.

Boletus varieties are not known to be toxic. Some are edible while others taste highly unpleasant. Many boletus quickly stain a dark blue when bruised or broken. This one in particular stayed its bright yellow color.

An easy marker of boletus for me are their bright velvety caps.

Tiny Pale Mushrooms In Compost And Straw

American Beautyberry - Callicarpa americana

The native Callicarpa americana flowers from the spring to the fall. Being that it is late June, I'm surprised I haven't seen more of them blooming. After blooming, the plant's fruit ripen to a beautiful bright pink/magenta color.

 I found this plant in a pine & oak flat woods but their distribution is throughout the area where they will be willing to grow in either mesic or xeric woods.

Beautyberry is often used in ornamental plantings, which I gladly support because of it's native status in Florida.

St. John's Wort

In the Hyperiaceae family, this native shrub lives low to the ground. Stems are smooth, leaves attached directly to the stem, growing alternate of each other. 

The flowers have four yellow petals that dry into seed containing capsules. I've found this particular St. John's Wort blooming during various times of our long growing season (spring-fall) but is perhaps able to bloom all year long in the pine flatwoods.

Psilocybin Cubensis Growing Freely in Florida

In Florida, the psychoactive mushroom Psilocybin Cubensis is a schedule 1 drug and is considered to have a "high potential for abuse and has no currently accepted medical use in treatment".  

...oh but of course. Well anyways, the fungi couldn't give a care what the lawmaker's of this country and state write up, they have been in existence for longer than you and I and they will continue to thrive. 

I found these in a grass patch in an area with rich soil that was previously occupied by cows and their rich manure.

So what's the deal if this "illegal" mushroom decides to drop spores and grow on your property? Are you at fault for it? Does that make you criminal drug cultivator? What if you pick them?

Since the Fiske vs Florida case, if you pick these mushrooms and are caught with them fresh you may not get in trouble for not having known of their identity or psychoactive effects since Florida law does not define the fungi or plants that contain psilocybin, just that psilocybin itself is illegal (but also illegal are the psilocybin containing materials, compounds, mixtures, or preparations) 

So WTF, it just sorta loops around and makes the mushrooms illegal without actually defining them.

This is the patch of grass I found them in, and where I left them behind. *Wink

Cited:

Florida Legislature

The Vaults of Erowid

Yellow Milkwort Blooming in May

Polygala rugelii, a Florida native grows as an annual revealing it's "poly" petals in early summers. Here I've found this Yellow Milkwort blooming in early summer although it can be found blooming later into the warm season, even into early fall.

It's location was a pine flatwood forrest.

According to Walter Kingsley Taylor's guide, Florida Wildflowers, the yellow milkwort is endemic. Its range from "counties south of Taylor, Suwannee, Colombia, Clay, and St. Johns.