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Key Features
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- Cap round to oval or cone-shaped and honeycombed with pits and ridges.
- Pits and ridges buff, tan, or yellow-brown at maturity.
- Cap completely intergrown with the stalk (joined to it along its full length).
- Entire mushroom hollow.
- Stalk without a sack or cup at base.
Other Features: Mostly medium-sized; pits sometimes darker when young; stalk usually whitish; odor not obnoxious.
Where: On ground in many habitats: woods, fruit orchards, gardens, sandy soil, wood chips, landscaped areas, etc.; widespread. It appears slightly earlier than the black morel and is not as prevalent at high elevations. A good place to check is under cottonwood and alder along streams.
Edibility: Among the most highly prized of all mushrooms, delicious fresh or dried. It should always be cooked.
Note: This is the familiar "sponge mushroom" of the Mid- west. It is fairly common in the river valleys of the West but, like the black morel, is extremely difficult to pick out against a backdrop of dead leaves. A giant version, M. crassipes, also occurs, especially in Oregon, and the white morel is common in coastal California.
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