Spring Foraging with Teton Fungiphiles

Name: Spring Foraging with Teton Fungiphiles
Start: 2025-05-22T17:30:00-06:00
Location: 125 Virginian Ln, Jackson, WY, United States, Wyoming 83001

Schedule

Thu, 22 May, 2025 at 05:30 pm

UTC-06:00

Location

125 Virginian Ln, Jackson, WY, United States, Wyoming 83001 | Jackson, WY

Please join Benji Sinclair and Matt Bambach, two of Teton Fungiphiles' group leaders, for a presentation covering the basics of spring mushroom foraging. We will cover everything from what to know before you go to what to look for once you do!

Matt Bambach has been foraging for mushrooms since his time living in the panhandle of North Idaho, but he's been fascinated by nature his entire life. After a childhood spent exploring the Green and White Mountains of the Northeast, he earned a Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Geography from Colgate University in 2014 and a Master's of Science in Water Resources Science from the University of Minnesota-Duluth in 2020. He has worked as a chef, farmer, builder, field researcher and educator. He is an Idaho Master Naturalist, gardener, canoeist, aspiring birder and mediocre climber. Thanks to his lifelong pursuit of skiing, he is grateful to call the Tetons home. When not enjoying time outdoors, Matt manages programs at Protect Our Water Jackson Hole where he is working to improve wastewater management and land use across our valley to restore and protect the water resources that allow our community to thrive. He believes whole-heartedly in the power of place and is as excited talking about the forcing factors behind toxic algae blooms as he is the beauty of spore prints or permaculture design principles.
Benji Sinclair grew up in southern New York and in Rome, Italy. His first love was snakes, and he has chased, handled or studied many of them on five continents. He holds a BS in Wildlife Ecology from Utah State and an MS in Zoology from U. Mass, Amherst. He served in the Peace Corps in Niger, where he created a national park herbarium and recorded Niger’s first two orchid species. In graduate school, he studied timber rattlesnakes in western Massachusetts before moving to Jackson in 1989. He worked at Teton Science Schools for 18 years in development, field instruction, and wildlife guiding. In 2010 he moved to Bhutan, where he created Bhutan’s first natural sciences library, funded by a MacArthur grant, and then taught courses in ecotourism and conservation science at the Royal University of Bhutan. While on a road trip, he reported the country’s first record of a Protobothrops himalayanus, the bejeweled mountain viper. He currently works as a guide in Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks and teaches classes in Italian for beginners. In 2022 he took up mushrooming as a hobby and now leads a FB group on wild fungi called Teton Fungophiles. He lives with his wife Liza in Jackson and volunteers as a winter trail ambassador for the Bridger-Teton National Forest.