I’m glad to see this info come out about the dangers of eating the seeds. But what about the mushrooms shown in the pictures released by the McCandless Foundation in their book “Back to the Wild”? Shouldn’t there be some discussion of them?

On day 89 of his “journal”, which is also shown in the book, McCandless wrote “many mushrooms” and below that the largest single word in the journal says “DREAM” with bold arrows pointing back at “many mushrooms”. On day 90 he wrote “2nd dream” along with the only indecipherable writing in the journal. Certainly one can assume he was eating the mushrooms he was gathering and that they were effecting him. When weather conditions allowed “many mushrooms” to suddenly appear they must have seemed like a “godsend” to a boy who knew he was starving. While not very nutritious they would have filled his stomach in a comforting way. But, right in the middle of a large pile of the mushrooms pictured on page 230 of “Back to the Wild” is an amanita muscaria.

A university of Alaska myecologist, Dr. Gary Laursen, identified 3 dangerous types of mushrooms (A. muscaria var. persicina or A. m. var. regalis, Calchiporus piperatus, Leccinum cf. atrostipitatum) in that picture and wrote this, “ I really do hope your friend is getting ID assistance of his fungi before ingestion, or he could end up in the hospital…”

It was just a few days after the “DREAM” entry, on day 94, that Chris wrote “extremely weak, fault of pot seed…” Was he also suffering from the effects of ingesting all those mushrooms? Dr. Laursen also wrote, “Had he eaten the Leccinum, more so than the Amanita I suspect, he might have been violently sick for 18–24 hrs. and lost appetite for several recovering days.” One would think that Chris would have known of the dangers of amanita but Wikipedia explains that the amanita mushroom “has been ingested in error, because immature button forms resemble puffballs” and that “the white spots sometimes wash away during heavy rain and the mushrooms then may appear to be the edible A. caesarea.” The physical effects can be lingering and cause “retrograde amnesia and somnolence.” Coupled with lethargy from the H. alpinum this does not sound like a helpful condition.

The amanita, while having caused death in some people, is also known to be psychoactive and to cause entheogenic revelations. Perhaps this helps explain Chris’s apparent acceptance of his fate and the enigmatic smile on his face as he waves goodbye in his last picture.