Fungi Collecting Day on Saturday, January 7, 2023

Ever wonder about all those mushrooms you’ve seen in the grasslands and forests at Point Reyes National Seashore? The Fungus Fair is a perfect opportunity to see them up close and learn more about them.

Since 2005, fungi have been gathered by volunteers who collect, identify, and catalog mushrooms for an ongoing study at the Point Reyes National Seashore.

10 am: Park visitors and the mushroom curious are invited to gather at 10 am on Saturday, January 7, 2023 at the Bear Valley Visitor Center for instructions on how to collect fungi for Sunday’s Fungus Fair. Bring bags or baskets and ways to keep collections separate (wax-paper works best). A pocket knife or trowel can help you to get entire mushrooms. Please document your collections, by noting habitat and location. Collecting labels will be provided. We cannot promise guided forays, and this is NOT about collecting edibles. In fact, we’d like to see any mushrooms, edible or not, donated for displays in our Fair.

1 pm to 3 pm: Bring your mushrooms to the Red Barn. We will ID your finds, and select the most beautiful and interesting and unusual examples for our Fair the next day.

Experienced collectors are welcome to go out on their own at any time—just be sure and bring your collections to the Red Barn before 3 pm.

During the Sixteenth Annual Fungus Fair on Sunday, January 8, 2023, wild mushrooms collected in the park will be on display on the south porch of the Bear Valley Visitor Center and many mushroom-related exhibits will be displayed inside the visitor center. Roving Mushroom Ambassadors will be available to answer your questions, both indoors and out. This is a free event, open to all.

For directions and a map to help you get to the Bear Valley Visitor Center, visit our Directions page.

To help reduce traffic congestion in the paved parking lot adjacent to the Bear Valley Visitor Center, please park your vehicle(s) in the gravel, trailhead/picnic area parking lot on the left (east) side of the access road close to the Bear Valley Trailhead. Parking is free. Download the Bear Valley Area Map (504 KB PDF), which shows the location of the trailhead parking lot relative to the Bear Valley Visitor Center.