Did you know that the White Button, Crimini, and Portobello are all the same fungus?! Meet the common edible mushroom Agaricus bisporus!


The White Button is just an immature fungus that has not been exposed to light. The Crimini is just a browned version of the same immature mushroom after it has been exposed to light. Finally, the Portobello mushroom is just the final mature stage of the fungal fruiting body!


Usually these three mushrooms are how children and adults alike are introduced to eating mushrooms for the first time. Unfortunately, often enough many people will not prefer the taste of the Agaricus bisporus, but, because they have been exposed to three versions of the same mushroom being sold as three distinct mushrooms, these people often develop the perception that all mushrooms must taste like this.


While it is true that some supermarkets and markets will pass other mushrooms off for Portobellos, most of the time, what is being marketed as these household name mushrooms is the Agaricus bisporus.

Some of the other names for Agaricus bisporus include:

• common mushroom
• cultivated mushroom 
• table mushroom
• champignon mushroom 
• Swiss brown mushroom
• Roman brown mushroom 
• Italian brown mushroom
• chestnut mushroom

Well, let me tell you now that there are a LOT of edible mushrooms out there and the each have their unique tastes! So, get a field guide and start learning about and tasting some of the incredible easy to identify edible mushrooms out there!

Ever heard of an underwater mushroom??
Meet Psathyrella aquaticus!

This mushroom species was discovered in the mid 2000s and was officially described in 2009 in an issue of Mycologia. The mushrooms were found growing in the waters of the upper Rogue River in Oregon, USA in a habitat which consists of spring fed aerated waters flowing on a volcanic substrate.

These mushrooms are especially interesting because there are very few Basidiomycetes that grow underwater, and of those that do, only these aregilled mushrooms! Most underwater fungal species are Ascomycetes or Hypomycetes. The mushrooms that are usually found underwater are often growing on wood submerged in the water rather than the substrate of the water bed.

These are very cool mushrooms, indeed!

To learn more, check out the published paper:
​Frank, Coffan, Southworth; "Aquatic gilled mushrooms: Psathyrella fruiting in the Rogue River in southern Oregon".Mycologia 102 (1): 93-107.