(Original Post Sept 4th 2008)

The last month has seen daytime highs in the low 90's or high 80's here in Knoxville... not what you'd consider typical shiitake mushroom weather. Just three weeks ago, our own shiitake log garden in North Hills was producing a handful of mushrooms after a decent rain.

Today we heard from shiitake log workshop attendee Daniel L. with similar news. His log was created in our workshop just about a year ago and the recent rains from the remnants of Faye seemed to have sparked a few fruits to emerge:

We're a little floored by these late summer, hot weather mushrooms volunteering themselves. Maybe it's the dry summer we've been having, but these rains are bringing on mushrooms when we'd normally not expect it. It must be time to start checking on the logs, especially after saturating rain.