Speaking of mushrooms, I've never been brave enough to collect my own, although I'm told that this is not a problem for knowledgeable people. There are just way too many toxic look-alikes for uninformed people like me to chance it in the wild, things like this-
The 'Death Cap' contains alpha-amanatin, an RNA Polymerase inhibitor that is one of the most potent hepatotoxins known, and ingestion by humans is almost invariably fatal. Scary.
That said, informed people forage for mushrooms all the time, with minimal risk. A Swiss postdoctoral fellow in my lab some years ago was particularly expert in this regard, and would regularly make trips to the Washington and Oregon foothills each Fall to collect mushrooms. This is such a serious endeavor in Switzerland that most pharmacies have a trained mycologist in-house, who will go through your 'wild-caught' mushrooms to identify any potentially toxic species (and then you'll have to throw the whole bag away). The ones you can buy in the local market are generally less tasty, but also less risky.
