Mushroom Foraging Is So Popular in Minnesota, the State Plans a Crackdown

ST. CROIX STATE PARK, Minn.—Peter Martignacco remembers a magical day after a big rain brought out an abundance of mushrooms in a state park an hour from his home outside Minneapolis. 

He crammed his backpack and a 3-gallon basket—twice—with a total of about 20 pounds of plump porcini mushrooms. When Martignacco, president of the 124-year-old Minnesota Mycological Society, went back a few days later to look for more, “I kind of cried a little,” he said. “There were a whole bunch there, but they were all mushy and consumed by insects and stuff like that.”