Kaduy greeted us with russula, chanterelles and caps.

The ancient pine and spruce forests of the Kaduysky District, growing on the sandy and marshy soils of the Mologo-Sudskaya Lowland, are a truly accessible nature reserve. You can encounter all sorts of things there. I wouldn't be surprised to see a mammoth or a rhinoceros there. Of course, mushroom pickers hinder my appreciation of the mushroom abundance. This isn't a reproach to them. But, for example, despite the fact that the scaly-breasted celandine thrives there, finding an edible member of the Boletaceae family is a real challenge. Chanterelles are plentiful this year, though. There's plenty for everyone. Russula mushrooms aren't being picked either. It's still a mystery to me why the ringed cap mushroom is so widely ignored. Unlike russula mushrooms, it's easy to identify and fill three buckets with. This mystery, of course, is purely formal. It's clear that no cap mushrooms make it into the traditional Vologda mushroom basket. At most, they earn the discreet title "toadstool." By the way, one of the cap mushroom families was being happily and vigorously devoured by a hypomyces mushroom. Most likely a goldenspore mushroom. But I could be wrong.

There were also a lot of webcaps. Unfortunately, webcap experts are in short supply, and I was only able to confidently identify the goat webcap.

Regular finds in the Kaduy forests are Hydnellums and Phellodons. Unfortunately, there were no guttate specimens this time, so I didn't have the chance to shock the public by drinking a bright red liquid.

As for the variegated parasol mushroom, I only found one small one. It's probably not the season yet.

There were also some pleasant finds. The celery rowan. The species is stenotope. It is listed as vulnerable on the IUCN Red List. There aren't many finds of this species in Russia, and this is the first for the Vologda Oblast. But I expected nothing less from the Kaduy forests.

A bonus was an encounter with a grey heron nesting right next to our camp.

And the dinner, consisting of chanterelles, potatoes, and beef stewed in cream, was officially named "Caduy-style ragu"!