Book: Foraging Mushrooms of the Rocky Mountains

Few springtime rituals excite the imagination like mushroom hunting—and few are more dangerous to the uninitiated. If you don’t have an experienced ’shroomer to help you learn the ropes—or even if you do—Foraging Mushrooms of the Rocky Mountains (Falcon Guides, $25) can help make the activity safer, more fun, and more fruitful. With abundant photographs and helpful descriptions of appearance, season, and dangerous look-alikes, this 200-page tome breaks down dozens of different edible mushrooms, along with recipes, biological information, and an all-important section on which species to avoid. Stash this book in your pack on every hike, from spring thaw until the snow flies, and odds are, your home-cooking efforts will benefit from the bounty of the fungal forest.