Advanced Mushroom Identification, Sept 6 @ 7: 30pm

Illinois Mycological Association

We are excited to have Alan Rockefeller with us this week for our Annual Foray and Show weekend as well as our Tuesday evening program. See the Annual Show description for his Sunday presentation.

This talk is not to teach specifics about advanced mushroom identification but to show you how to use the powerful new tools that are now easily available to everyone. Alan discusses several websites where anyone with a smart phone can get a professional ID quickly and will live demo Mushroom Observer and iNaturalist. Alan will also cover basic information on microscopy: which microscope to get, how to use it and what to look for, and DNA analysis, including a live demo using BLAST and building a phylogenetic tree.

Alan Rockfeller specializes in mushroom taxonomy. He has been collecting mushrooms for over 15 years, and has traveled to Mexico to collect mushrooms for the past 9 summers. Alan is a network security expert, a moderator at the Shroomery Mushroom Hunting and Identification Forum, and posts all of his mushroom photographs on mushroomobserver.org. When he is not hunting mushrooms Alan spends his time looking at mushrooms under the microscope, soldering electronics, hacking unix and sequencing mushroom DNA.

Niles Historical & Cultural Center is about a tenth of a mile Southeast from the Golf-Mill Shopping center. The former sheriff’s office has parking behind the building. The meeting room is on the third floor and is accessible by elevator as well as a large staircase. Restrooms are available on first and third floors. A museum volunteer will open the building for us this evening. For public transport from the city, take the Blue Line to the Jefferson Park CTA Station, from there it is 20 minutes on the PACE #270 bus to Milwaukee and Elizabeth. The museum is open to the public Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from 10:30 AM to 3:00 PM.

http://www.illinoismyco.org/?event=2016-09-06