Here’s the finished foraging commission! It was fun arranging these items which are familiar to me, too—ramps, morels, purple coneflower, black raspberry. And some beautiful white bluebells. 🍂
Here’s an early stage of a foraging-themed commission I worked on last month. Though this eventually received color, I can’t help but love the simple black ink look. 🌻
So happy that some of my Inktober originals from last year have recently found new homes! A few are still available and now listed on my Etsy store.
I’m gearing up for this year’s Inktober. Can’t wait to share the theme I’ve chosen with y’all. 🎃
For today’s Mushroom Monday, a quick rendering of some beautiful Wood Ear my partner found a couple weeks back. Wood Ear or Tree-Ear is an edible jelly fungus that really is shaped like an ear! I tried a new technique, doing the mushroom in colored pencil and a monochrome watercolor wash for the branch. I think I like it!
There’s lots of rain here again today—maybe some new mushroom friends will be popping up in the next couple days? 🍄
Lately, I’ve had mainly pet portraits to share while I work on some other commissions and projects. To break it up I thought I’d post this field sketch of Chicken of the Woods I did a couple years ago in Monterey. At the time I knew little about mushrooms, so I did my best to carefully document this shelf mushroom growing on a eucalyptus tree. When I later ID’d it, I was delighted to find out it’s a choice edible, and one that’s fairly easily identified. Hope to sketch some more shrooms as it warms up!
I’m back with another Stardew Valley drawing! This is the purple mushroom, one that I wanted to do but couldn’t fit into the 31 days of Inktober. The scientific name for this mushroom is Cortinarius violaceus, and it’s a gorgeous violet fungus that grows across the northern hemisphere. I was surprised to learn that they are actually edible (but certainly don’t go eating any purple mushroom you find—except in Stardew Valley, of course)!⠀
I have been yearning to continue these nature object drawings, expanding beyond Stardew Valley and capturing interesting items (especially edible ones) that one might find outside. I’ve struggled to find a tangible thread to create a series out of, but I have always loved the intersection between food and outdoor exploration. So in 2020 I hope to continue making these little sketches regularly, and develop them further! I hope you all enjoy these as much as I do. 💜
Inktober 28 — Red Mushroom.
Despite its whimsical appearance, this mushroom—in real life and in Stardew Valley—is toxic! It is called the fly agaric mushroom (Amanita muscaria) and it grows all over the world.
I’m on the home stretch!!
For Inktober, I am drawing forageable items from the game Stardew Valley.
Inktober 27 — Chanterelle.
The most elegant and beautiful mushroom in the world, I would argue. If anyone knows a prettier one, enlighten me! I’d be ecstatic to find a golden chanterelle like this one. 😊
For Inktober, I am drawing forageable items from the game Stardew Valley.
Inktober 07 — Morel.
Morels were probably the first food I actually foraged. While on a birding outing with a class in northern Michigan, one of my friends came across a morel—a squat, wrinkly looking mushroom—and we were ecstatic. As we continued walking, we spotted more and more, until we had collected about 50 in total! Later on we fried them up and had a mushroom feast. They are one of the tastiest and easier to identify mushrooms out there!
For Inktober, I am drawing forageable items from the game Stardew Valley.
Inktober 05 — Common Mushroom.
The first of several mushrooms this month! In Stardew Valley, the “common mushroom” is represented by a generic brown capped mushroom. Originally I was going to draw an Agaricus species, like the gilled button mushrooms you typically get at the grocery store. But yesterday my partner found this beautiful bolete and it begged to be drawn! I thought it would fit the “common mushroom” bill. 😉 Not entirely happy with this one, but I couldn’t afford to spend a ton of time on it. On to day six!
For Inktober, I am drawing forageable items from the game Stardew Valley.
Kirtland's warbler, black morels, and wild blueberry from my recent scratchboard piece!
Scratchboard morels almost finished! (Part of a much larger piece)
This past fall I came across these mushrooms on a eucalyptus tree. Knowing nothing about fungi and little about plants in central CA, I took down as many notes as I could, and later identified it as sulfur shelf mushrooms, or “chicken of the woods,” a common edible! Turns out the “decayed” part of the tree was where the fungus was digesting it.