Then there's that all time favorite, the mildly (?) psychedelic Amanita Muscaria , beloved by the ancients as Soma
See the Colors: 
Posted on 08/26/2009 10:52:39 AM PDT by Shermy
[from Finland] Four people have had to seek medical treatment after having eaten white Amanitas (Amanita virosa), highly toxic mushrooms also known as "destroying angels". Two of the patients have been brought to the intensive care unit of the Surgical Hospital in Helsinki, and it is likely that yet another patient with mushroom poisoning will end up in the same hospital. Only one of the four victims can be treated in a central hospital of his or her own hospital area. The four persons with mushroom poisoning come from various parts of Southern Finland.
The poisoning victims who have been brought to Helsinki are in serious condition, and their lives are in danger. Chief physician Anna-Maria Koivusalo of the intensive care unit of Helsinki’s Surgical Hospital reports that four patients with mushroom poisoning during one weekend is an exceptionally large number. The Surgical Hospital has annually treated one to five patients suffering from severe mushroom poisoning. Milder cases are treated locally in a central hospital. Previously the number of mushroom poisonings was higher than average in 2005.
The patients brought to the Surgical Hospital are being treated with the so-called molecular adsorbents recirculating system (MARS), a form of artificial liver support that has the potential to remove toxins from the organs. If the MARS therapy is not sufficient, the patients should have liver transplant surgery as soon as possible. Following Amanita poisoning, the patient gets severe symptoms within less than 12 hours. Such symptoms include vomiting and dehydration. The patient also feels very sick. Mushroom poisoning leads to liver necrosis within approximately ten days.
The white Amanita is often mistaken for blushing wood mushrooms (Agaricus silvaticus). However, while white Amanitas are very common, blushing wood mushrooms are a very rare species, which can hardly ever be found in the Finnish woods. Other species that bear a passing resemblance to this killer are the field (or meadow) mushroom (Agaricus campestris) and horse mushroom (Agaricus arvensis). In general, physicians and mushroom experts advise all uncertain mushroom-pickers to leave all white mushrooms in the forest.
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Ping.
If I am not mistaken, the equally poisonous Amanita Muscaria can be found here in North America.
Then there's that all time favorite, the mildly (?) psychedelic Amanita Muscaria , beloved by the ancients as Soma
See the Colors:
Amantia Mucaria is a psychoactive mushroom found in the entire Northern Hemisphere. it has had a long history in the pre-Christian religious practices of Europe as a hallucinogenic. I wondered if that is what they thought that they were eating.
"Because it's just too hard to go to the supermarket" Ping.
North American Amanita Muscaria is not considered a big time psychedelic product ~ something is missing in the soil, PLUS there are 238 FAR MORE POWERFUL psychedelic mushrooms and plants readily available in the Americas.
Early "still semi-pagan" Sa'ami settlers abandoned the use of Amanita and adopted Peyote in fact.
You are so right. Good mushrooms are hard to find ~
Funny, I used to roam the cow pastures back in the 70’s and the ‘schrooms we picked looked nothing like any of those pictures. And believe you me, they were the “trippin” kind.
Muscaria is nothing to be trifled with, but its not nearly as poisonous as the Amanita in this article. It was a shamanic mushroom in, I believe, Siberia.
My wife and I went to an Asian market last weekend. The mushroom assortment was huge.
Some years ago my sons and I bought several mushroom identification books and thought we were ‘ready’.
But alas, I didn’t have the stones to try one of my id’ed specimens.
I’ll leave it to the experts.
That is the first or second deadliest mushroom in the world. They will be treated with milk thistle seed or they will likely die.
NAC + Milk Thistle, stat, eating mushrooms is dangerous busienss.
North America has different soil conditions than Asia, different climate, and different species histories.
I don’t know what NAC is. Is that different from the MARS treatment described in the article? I don’t know about a liver transplant being sufficient if the MARS treatment fails. IIRC Amanita virosa also causes kidney failure. Milk thistle. The French have substantiated its success. It not only stops the tissue destruction it stimulates liver regeneration. Nothing else does that I know of.
NAC (N-Acetyl-Cysteine) - An aboslute miracle of an amino acid, given to those who OD on acetaminophen to protect the liver. But, it’s main role is for building Glutathione (powerhouse of your immune system) and detoxing free radicals, including heavy metals like Lead and Mercury. I take it every day ... Oh, and it’s almost impossible to get the flu while on it (google it)
Which brings up an interesting historical question. By and large the easier a mushroom is to grow/ find the more likely it is to be toxic, so who are the people that found the good mushrooms and why were they willing to take the chance.
Milk thistle seed is a must-know herb for most toxic poisoning affecting the liver. It should be combined with psyllium seed (Metamucil) to carry the toxins out of the body or the blood stream will just take them up again from the intestines.
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