March meandered in like a lamb and roared out like a lion weather-wise, but for us, it roared all month long! We started off strong with an evening of lobbying with the farm bureau, moved swiftly into a decadent meal by Chef David Stein in our shop, through a mushroom experience dinner with Chef Matt Olley at the Indian Ladder Farms Cidery & Brewery tasting room to a cooking class at Capital Cooks featuring wine and mushrooms! We added 2 new strains to our cultivated mix, enoki and comb tooth, and finally harvested a tiny batch of cordyceps that Sam coaxed to life.
Indian Ladder Farms Cidery and Brewery featuring Chef Matt Olley
Dinner on the Farm featuring Chef David Stein
2nd Sunday Poetry and Prose open mic
We printed a 3rd volume of mushroom coloring pages! This one includes all the previous art, additional works by a few of the artists already featured, as well as new pieces by Dave Matthews, Sandra Winnie, and John Zoccoli. These are available in our shop now for just $10 each!
We love seeing people have success with fruiting mushrooms at home!
We were visited by the Capital District Tourism Gnome!
Read an article about Henry Bellagnome and his traveling Gnome here:
https://www.timesunion.com/food/article/henry-bellagnome-garden-gnome-promotes-capital-19358775.php
Follow his social media on Instagram @tourism_gnome
The New York State Museum posted this great piece on women mycologists as part of their celebration of women who have made an impact in various fields of study!
Our mushroom compost is being spread all around the capital district.
If you are local to the 518 and you garden, farm, or indoor grow at all, you should be taking advantage of our mushroom compost blocks. Check out this article on Civil Eats about mushroom compost, Managing Brown Gold:
Every Wednesday (with a few rare exceptions) you can find us at the Helderberg Mountain Brewing Copmany’s tasting room on Main Street in East Berne. We also have a selection of fresh and dried products for purchase. And the Brewery has a variety of delicious beverages.
Amy and Avery taught another class at Capital Cooks in Albany. This one pairing Mushrooms and Wine. Stay tuned for more mushroom classes by our team, or check out one of their other classes.
Stop in and see our identifying wild and cultivated mushrooms display. Build on your knowledge of the fungi growing around us!
Our industry partners are always cooking up such delicious treats! Make sure you go try them all!
While they don’t use our mushrooms in their beer making (yet) Fidens Brewing loves our fresh mushrooms for their marketing shots!
Psilocybin Corner
Our Monthly New Yorkers for Mental Health Alternatives meeting was a review of all the action items and meetings from February with planning discussions for future actions later in the year. This year we met with AM Gunther (Chair of the Assembly Mental Health Committee), Senator Walczyk, Senator Ryan, Senator Mannion, Senator Brouk (Senate Chair of the Committee for Mental Health), Senator Canzoneri-Fitzpatrick, and AM Slater. We have a screening, panel, and discussion with the team from Reconsider scheduled at the Capitol on April 4th for lawmakers that includes retired FDNY member Joe McKay and retired NYPD officer Ethan Abend.
If you missed our March meeting and are interested, you can watch it here:
If you missed the Screening and Panel discussion at The Linda on February 26th you can catch the entire thing (just not the films themselves) here:
Corinne and Avery were interviewed by Sean from Reconsider about the efforts we’ve been putting in as we work towards legal access for psilocybin containing mushrooms in New York.
The Next New Yorkers for Mental Health Alternatives meeting will be Tuesday, April 9th at 7pm. We will be featuring Crystal and Veronika from Visionary Veterans. Join us in person at the farm, or through the zoom link here:
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/81854729934?pwd=ZE4xSlJKdm1hbWN0Z3o4UnFBOHJuZz09
Our advocacy friends, The Baystaters for Natural Medicine, in Massachusetts are having a Fun Fungi Fest in Lee on April 14th! If you’re free, you should go support!
Here’s a fascinating article on Psilocybin containing mushrooms and their impact on Lyme Disease:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9990519
Coming Soon
April NYMHA Meeting. Tuesday, April 9th. 7pm – 8:30pm. Featuring guest speakers from Visionary Veterans, a women lead veteran group out of Florida.. At the farm or through zoom:
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/81854729934?pwd=ZE4xSlJKdm1hbWN0Z3o4UnFBOHJuZz09
Hudson Valley Community College Leisure and Special Interest Class “Mushrooms Mycelium and More” Monday evenings April 8 – April 29. THIS CLASS IS SOLD OUT.
Dinner on the Farm featuring chef Agata Dziedzic-Dean. Saturday, April 13. A Vegan Polish Feast! $75/seat. Tickets available at our Farm store or through eventbrite with a fee. Tickets for this dinner are nearly sold out!
This dinner is presented in collaboration with Flowering Sun Ecology in Ellenville, NY
2nd Sunday Poetry and Prose, Sunday, April 14th 2pm – 3:30pm
Baystaters Mushroom Fest in Lee at Sweetgrass Botanicals Dispensary, Sunday, April 14th 1 – 5p
https://www.shopsweetgrass.com
Troy Public Library Free Talk. Thursday, April 18. This talk will focus on health and wellness benefits of mushrooms. Register for the event here:
https://engagedpatrons.org/EventsExtended.cfm?SiteID=4294&EventID=520085&PK=
Dinner on the Farm featuring the Culinary Duo of Corinne Carey and Dave Chaiken. Saturday, May 4th 5:30 – 8:30pm. This event is being offered in collaboration with the Foraged New York Festival and will feature foraged ingredients in every course.
Foraged New York 2024 May 4th – 11th (our 3rd year of bringing wild harvested excitement to the Capital Region)
https://www.foragednewyork.org
Growing Mushrooms Workshop at Pitney Gardens, Tuesday, May 14th 5 – 6p. Hands on Workshop where you will learn 3 different ways to grow mushrooms outdoors. Register for the class and choose your mushroom strain here:
Maine Fungi Festival May 18th – 19th
We have elected to attend this year’s festival as guests. We’re really excited to explore what Maine’s Fungi Festival has to offer!
https://www.mainefungifest.com
Arbor Hill Library:Home Mushroom Farming for Health and Wellness Program, Monday, May 20 5:30p – 6:30p. An introduction to various home cultivation techniques and mushroom health and wellness information.
https://albany.librarycalendar.com/event/home-mushroom-farming-health-wellness-15339
Music and Creativity Celebration featuring Photographer Randall Collura and Musician Manuel Perez III, Saturday, June 1st 5pm – 8pm
Randall Collura has been an active amateur photographer for almost 50 years. In the old days he spent a lot of time in the darkroom developing film and printing B&W photos but the digital age has changed all that. What hasn’t changed is the challenge and thrill of creating an image. Over the years he expanded the range of subjects he photographs but he still walks through the woods snapping photos just as happily now as he did as a teenager. He also has a PhD in Biological Anthropology as well as a MS in Molecular Biology and has taught anthropology and biology at the college and high school level. He currently works for the NY State DOH doing data analysis and research.
Manuel J. Perez III (any pronouns) is an interdisciplinary artist, composer, performer, improviser, and researcher based in the northeastern USA. Treating all media, processes, and actions as generative vehicles of expression, their artwork integrates disciplines such as performance art, free improvisation, experimental composition, collage, architecture, poetry, artificial intelligence, and more. Their works often foreground the lived histories of everyday people as a means to investigate how ways of becoming and knowing are enabled through performativity, sociality, self-expression, and spontaneous action. They believe deeply in the power of togetherness, and prioritize the creation of art that encourages the development of community, empathy, and understanding of oneself and others. Their artistic work has been shared within many universities, communities, and festivals around the world.
Working with Medicinal Mushrooms Workshop with John Michelotti Sunday, June 2nd. Registration will be through the Catskill Fungi Events Calendar once the event is posted.
Dinner on the Farm featuring the Chef Jisung Jeon, Saturday, June 8th 5:30 – 8:30pm. Tickets and more information coming soon.
Metal Amongst the Mushrooms, Sunday, June 9th 3:30 – 6:30. All ages show featuring Local Doom Metal Band Carnwennan, Compress out of Holyoke, and Radiation Blackbody, a two piece instrumental prog-violence band out of Brooklyn. $10 suggested donation.
Allied Brewing Music Festival, Saturday, June 22 We’ll be vending at this festival. More details to come.
https://alliedbrewingcompany.com
For the Love of Fungi 3 Saturday, July 27. Our friends at Mycohilic are putting together the third year of the For the Love of Fungi Festival in Ashokan at the Ashokan Center! Be sure to check it out!
https://www.mycophilic.net/for-the-love-of-fungi
Music and Creativity Collaboration featuring Artist Rebecca Santosousso and Psytrance DJ Songsten Saturday, August 10th. 5:30 – 8:30+
Rebecca Giel Santosuosso is an abstract artist working out of Troy, NY with a BFA from the College of Saint Rose, a BA in Psychology from SUNY Albany as well as a pending Master’s in the same subject. She works in mental health, feeding concepts from her clinical work back into her art through themes of identity, divinity, and social justice. You can find more of her work at rebeccagiel.com
DJ Songsten: Old World Old School Old Style. “I like to travel like Doctor Who with all these worlds in my hard drive…”
Adirondack Mushroom Mania 2024 Saturday August 24th 2024. As part of the mania, we will be curating a mushroom dining experience in collaboration with Chef David Stein on Friday, August 23rd, ! Stay tuned for details.
Dinner on the Farm Featuring Chef Kate Ray, Saturday, September 14th, 5:30 – 8:30pm. More details coming soon.
Collar City Mushrooms 