It wouldn’t be Christmas time without oyster mushrooms… is something most people don’t say. But something I have increasingly been saying over the last 4 years. Since I discovered a tree magnificently fruiting full of oyster mushrooms on a short walk from my house and have since built something of a relationship with this tree and its fungal inhabitants.

This is part 5 of the oyster mushroom saga and you can read parts 1-4 over on Filter Feeder (something I highly recommend because it’s a story of highly and lows, friendship and grief).

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It’s December 2025, a lot has happened since last December when the oyster mushroom tree was last fruiting. I have moved into my little flat, taken the asbestos out and slowly moved flooring, furniture and appliances in. I’ve been living here for 7 months now and though it’s taken a while to get here I am really feeling at home. I love living alone, and in many ways I am more at peace than I ever have been. The flat sits just behind the house I lived in when I first met the oyster mushroom tree (weirdly I can even see into my old bedroom!). I am once again just a short walk away from this old friend, but I don’t check in as often as I used to.

Other parts of my life are slightly less peaceful and calm. After years of waiting lists and a couple of appointments I finally have a date for top surgery coming up in January. It’s incredibly exciting but after many delays and admin issues I got 6 weeks notice of the actual date and have much to prepare while also spending my first Christmas in my new flat and preparing for impending unemployment come the end. So not so ideally my top surgery recovery time will be spend frantically applying for jobs which is less than ideal.

There’s something about job hunting that is just so demoralising, soul destroying even. Preparing for an unknown amount of time spent looking, an unknown amount of rejections, to not know where exactly I’ll end up come April. Plus the whole sector I work in going through massive redundancy processes currently means there’s a real possibility I’ll have a long road ahead or have to switch sectors to find work….. yeah I’m a bit stressed.

Another unknown a bit closer in time is if the oyster mushroom tree will fruit again and if so, when? I know it might not fruit forever, and we’ve had an abnormally warm autumn and winter so far…

It’s quite by accident I do find it fruiting. It’s 16th December. I’m on the way to the doctor’s, not my doctors but my partner’s. He’s getting bloods taken and testosterone injected and is not a big fan of needles so I’m heading to meet them for moral support.

It’s a stunning December day, the sun is out and it’s ridiculously warm for the time of year. I’ve given myself plenty of time for the walk so decide to treat myself to the long way and walk through the parks to just check in on my friend oyster mushroom tree.

I walk straight past at first, just like the first time, unsure if I do actually have time to stop but I check my phone and decide I can give a cheeky 5 minute check. I retrace my steps and carefully pick my way through the mud to get to it. It’s sprouting! I feel… mixed?

There are small bulbous pins of mushrooms along the side of the log, some have been smashed off and lie unceremoniously on the ground just like last year. I’m hit with a wave of joy to see them, a wave of grief at the unnecessary destruction, and a wave of uncertainty.

Just like last year the biggest flush lies between the two main logs where the main trunk of the tree has been split. It’s nothing like the scenes of year one but there are a few handfuls of solid mushrooms, some up to 8cm across. The main feeling now is joy, what a day to be outside, what a day to meet an old friend.

I take some pictures, check the time, and hurt off towards the doctor’s practically skipping, with a building deep sense of gratitude warming my body.

My boyfriend’s appointment is a bit of a dud, bloods are taken but he forgot his vial of testosterone so the shot is postponed till later in the afternoon. He’s understandable frustrated but I convince him that a walk through the parks and a coffee will help dissipate his annoyance (and I have a not so secret ulterior motive to introduce him to the oyster mushrooms).

We buy pistachio hot chocolate, chai and cake and sit under a meandering branched oak tree to soak in the sun while he comes back to himself. Then it’s mushroom time!

He is not as excited about them as I am but is happy about my excitement at least. We take pictures, he listens to be babbly random facts about oysters and my previous encounters. Then I am uhmming and ahhing about whether to pick some. They are not at their biggest yet, I could wait a day or two and come back to bigger mushrooms so I have a better amount to cook with. But if I wait they could all have been knocked off by last year and then I’ll have none to eat! They encourage me to pick them now, and so I do, struggling to pull them away without a knife. They’re thick and meaty, I think this was the right decision.

This year it isn’t just the oyster mushrooms inhabiting this log though, many signs of decay are clear by the abundance of other fungi. This is something that you’d think would make me sad but I am a huge fan of dead wood and its fungal inhabitants and it makes me very happy to seethe cycle of life continue on this tree that gave me so much wonder four years ago.

oyster mushroom tree part 5 hairy curtain crust.jpg

Hairy Curtain crust (left) and a peziza sp. (right)

There is a big flush of hairy curtain crust (Crawen Flewog, Stereum hirsutum), their orange pores and fluffy tops adding both texture and colour to this log. There’s also a cup fungi, a peziza of some kind (though what species I have not determined) with it’s slightly wobbly texture and alien like shape.

I wonder what else I’ll find here in the coming years, if I’ll encounter other species new to me, or familiar friends here as I visit this tree, now stump and logs, that takes up a big space in my heart.

More pictures are taken to commemorate the moment and after some lunch we all aprt ways. Me with the mushrooms sat in a pocket of my bag.

The mushrooms sit in my fridge for several days. I feel a need to eat them and make the most of them, not waste this precious yearly gift. But I don’t know how I want to cook them, to honour this moment. Then I’m amongst friends talking about confusing pale oysters with angel wings. Mine are grey oysters, not growing on conifer and I’ve met them over many years but I am self conscious. Have I got it wrong? I double check on three different sites and decide I’m being silly.

I’m at the point where I have to just make something, something special is too much pressure. So I make a stir fry with what I have in my house: egg noodles, egg, pak choi, and the mushrooms. It’s basic but the moment they hit the pan and the smell of oyster mushrooms enters my nose I remember how much I love them. I should buy them more, though that will never compare to this.

The stir fry turns out kinda badly… I botch the timings and don’t have much to make a sauce with, nothing quite works together. But I am happy to have eaten the foraged friends, feels like an achievement, a milestone. I am happy I’ve met these mushrooms again this year, I wonder how many more year's we’ll continue meeting like this? Who else will come along?

One thing I do know is that Christmas really does = oyster mushrooms forever now.

Oyster Mushroom Saga Part 5: New Friends Join

Falling in love with winter, solstice musings, and resting through winter