Photo show ends Mushroom Week

Photos: Mats Kangur
Interview with Mats by: Toivo Tuberik
Translation: Liis
 
Mats Kangur showed his nature photos at Rõuge on Saturday, Spetember 12.
 
Wolf's milk or toothpaste slime mold.
 
Your relations with fungi?
Mushrooms were called forest meat at home. There was a certain tree stump in the garden where woodtufts grew, at the hedge there were parasol mushrooms, father sometimes brought a handful of champignons from the horse stables. And of course in the woods behind the house there were known and certain places for milk caps and russulas. I have been thinking recently that these mushrooms were not only simply tasty mouthfuls, but really acquaintances. Permanent local residents. Individuals! Going mushroom picking has been a part of autumn from childhood on. And maybe I enjoy the rambles and the picking even more than the delicacies cooked from them

.

 
Velvet roll-rim.

Which mushrooms do you pick for your photos?
Basically I have concentrated on faster creatures. Plants and mushrooms haven’t been very frequent models. Usually I ramble around with a long objective and most mushroom photographing is still to come. As with everything a nudge from somewhere is needed. I have noticed that after last autumn’s mushroom camp I already stop more often at mushrooms.

Do you have some recent mushroom discoveries?
A rather late discovery is the puffballs. At home they were not eaten. It was simply that nobody had told us about them. The nice thing is that nearly all puffballs growing here are edible. I fry them in butter, thinly sliced. Very nice!

The photo surprise however came from the scrambled eggs slime mold. Sometimes it is good to work with mushrooms on a windy day, especially the shelf fungi. They won’t sway as the plants do. You can expose at your leisure and spend an enjoyable time. But the scrambled eggs slime mold is a mobile thing. And I didn’t know that it was so to such a degree! I set up a longish exposure and noticed that it wasn’t focused sharply enough. I reset focus and shutter but it was still somehow smudgy. Then, checking the sequence of exposures I got a surprise. The fungus had made itself unfocused by moving!

 
White saddle (Helvella crispa).


 

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