Mushroom season 2026: when does each species grow?
From chanterelle to trumpet chanterelle: the 12 most important edible mushrooms in Finland, their seasons by region, preparation and the rules for selling them. And when you can't get to the forest, see what pickers are selling right now.
Mushroom season 2026 – where we are now
The season started well: chanterelles, boletes and brittlegills were found already in July in Southern and Central Finland, because the early-summer rains fell at the right time. Moisture was uneven, though – one forest can be productive while the next is too dry.
Mushroom yields cannot be forecast the way berry crops can: fruiting bodies appear only when moisture and warmth coincide. Several weeks of heat and drought will stop even a promising season, and in good conditions several flushes can follow one another. The Finnish Meteorological Institute's seasonal outlook puts September–November above average in temperature, which may stretch the trumpet chanterelle season into late autumn.
Sources: Marjastaja.fi 21 July 2026; Yle 2026; Finnish Meteorological Institute seasonal outlook.
The windows are indicative. In Northern Finland the season starts about 2–3 weeks later than in the south, and in Lapland the gap can reach three weeks.
May–June
False morel, morel
Spring species come up on sandy ground, clear-cuts and sun-baked roadsides. False morel is poisonous unless treated.
July
Chanterelle, orange birch bolete, brittlegills
The first chanterelle flush arrives after mid-July if it rained in late June.
Peak season across the country. August rainfall decides the September crop.
September
Boletes, black trumpet, trumpet chanterelle, milk caps
Trumpet chanterelle usually starts in September and lasts the longest of them all.
October
Trumpet chanterelle, black trumpet, hedgehog mushroom
Night frosts finish off the capped species, but trumpet chanterelle survives a few degrees below zero.
November
Trumpet chanterelle
Until the snow: trumpet chanterelle keeps going until the first lasting frosts.
Finland's most important edible mushrooms
Chanterelle
Cantharellus cibarius
July–October
Identification:
Egg-yellow throughout and funnel-shaped. Under the cap there are no thin gills but thick, forking ridges that run down the stem. The flesh is white and the smell fruity, like apricot.
Where it grows:
Mossy spruce and mixed forests, forest-road verges and slopes. The same spot produces year after year, so mark it down.
Use and preparation:
No parboiling needed. Fry first in a dry pan until the liquid has evaporated. Freezes best fried, and dries well too.
Note:
The false chanterelle is more orange and has thin, crowded gills – not deadly, but it ruins a dish. The serious confusion is with the deadly webcap, which is brown and dry-surfaced.
Identification:
Brown, dry-shiny cap and a stout pale stem with a pale net pattern on its upper part. Under the cap are pores instead of gills: white at first, yellowish later. The flesh does not change colour when cut.
Where it grows:
Spruce, pine and birch forests, often at the edges of forest roads and clearings. It comes up fast after rain – and the flies find it just as fast.
Use and preparation:
Cook thoroughly. Drying is the best way to preserve it: the aroma intensifies and a one-litre jar lasts the winter. Young, firm caps also freeze well fried.
Note:
The bitter bolete looks similar but is sharply bitter: its pores turn pink and its stem carries a dark net. It is not poisonous, but a single piece ruins the pan.
Identification:
Brownish, funnel-shaped thin-fleshed cap, a yellowish hollow stem and sparse, forking ridges underneath. Grows in dense stands, so one spot often fills the basket.
Where it grows:
Damp spruce forests, moss carpets and the sides of decaying wood. Also thrives on old ditch banks and the edges of spruce mires.
Use and preparation:
No parboiling needed. Dries superbly and keeps for years; fry before freezing. The mild flavour suits sauces and soups.
Note:
Our most productive commercial mushroom and the last of the season: it survives a few degrees of night frost and keeps growing into October.
Identification:
Dark grey to black trumpet with thin flesh and a soft, wrinkled outer surface. Grows in groups and blends into the litter so well that you usually find it on your knees.
Where it grows:
Herb-rich spruce forests and clay slopes, mostly in Southern and South-western Finland.
Use and preparation:
A powerful, almost truffle-like aroma. Dry it and grind it into powder – a teaspoon is enough to season a sauce. No parboiling needed.
Note:
It has no poisonous look-alikes, so it suits a beginner – once you learn to see it at all.
Identification:
Orange-brown cap with darker zones and greenish patches with age. Broken flesh exudes carrot-orange milk.
Where it grows:
Pine forests and dry heaths, often under young pines and on sandy roadsides.
Use and preparation:
Saffron milk caps are mild and can be fried without parboiling. Salting is the traditional method. Other milk caps must be parboiled.
Note:
The orange milk separates saffron milk caps from other milk caps. The spruce milk cap growing in spruce forest is just as good.
Identification:
A brain-like, folded brown hollow cap on a short pale stem. Appears as soon as the snow melts.
Where it grows:
Sandy ground, clear-cuts, burnt sites and roadsides – often where soil has been disturbed.
Use and preparation:
Poisonous unless treated. Boil twice for at least 5 minutes in plenty of water (1 part mushrooms, 3 parts water) and rinse thoroughly after each boiling. Pour the water away and do not breathe the steam – boil under an extractor hood or outdoors.
Note:
When sold, false morel must carry a warning about its toxicity and the Finnish Food Authority's handling instructions. In loose sales the information must be on display at the point of sale.
Identification:
A honeycombed, pitted cap that is hollow all the way through, stem included.
Where it grows:
Sun-baked sandy soils, clear-cuts, garden bark mulch and roadsides.
Use and preparation:
Always cook thoroughly; raw it irritates the stomach. The aroma is at its strongest when dried.
Note:
You tell it from false morel by the hollow structure: the morel's cap is honeycombed and empty inside, the false morel's is folded and chambered.
Always check your own situation with your municipal food control authority and the Finnish Food Authority. The summary below is not an official instruction.
Picking is an everyone's right
Wild mushrooms may be picked on someone else's land without permission, including for sale. Yards, cultivated land and plantings are excluded, and nature reserves have their own restrictions. When collecting large volumes it is good practice to ask the landowner.
The income is often tax-free
Income from selling wild mushrooms you picked yourself is tax-free when they are sold as they are. Cleaning, sorting and packing do not remove the exemption. Dried, frozen, preserved or ground mushrooms are processed products and taxable – as is picking done as paid work.
Collecting needs no notification – processing does
Selling self-collected mushrooms as such directly to consumers or to local retail does not require a primary production notification. Once mushrooms are dried, preserved or otherwise processed for sale, it becomes food premises activity that must be notified to municipal food control.
The commercial mushroom decree is gone – the seller is responsible
The national commercial mushroom decree was repealed on 1 July 2012. The Finnish Food Authority maintains a list of recommended edible mushrooms including porcini, velvet bolete, slippery jack, milk caps, brittlegills, chanterelle, trumpet chanterelle, black trumpet, sheep polypore, hedgehog mushroom, morels and matsutake. Under the Food Act (297/2021) the seller is responsible for the safety of what is sold.
At a market and a pickup point, state the origin
In outdoor and loose sales the buyer must be told the product name and country of origin. For false morel, the warning and handling instructions must also be on display. On Willit the listing asks for this up front, and the harvest date and region are shown to the buyer.
Cut off the base and brush away needles right there in the basket – a clean mushroom keeps better and does not soil the rest of the batch. Do not soak in water if you plan to dry them.
Fresh for a couple of days only
Fresh mushrooms keep 1–2 days in the fridge in a paper bag or a shallow dish. A plastic bag sweats and spoils the batch fast.
Parboil the milk caps
Milk caps and other bitter species are boiled for 5–10 minutes in plenty of water and the water is poured away. Saffron milk caps are mild and need no parboiling.
False morel twice
False morel is boiled twice for at least 5 minutes in plenty of water (1 part mushrooms, 3 parts water) and rinsed after each boiling. Pour the water away and ventilate the steam.
Drying preserves the aroma
Dry at 40–50 °C until the mushroom crackles. Boletes, trumpet chanterelle and black trumpet are at their best dried and keep for years in an airtight jar.
Freeze them fried
Chanterelles, boletes and hedgehog mushrooms are fried or heated before freezing: they take less space and keep their texture until the next season.
Poisonous mushrooms – learn these five
Pick only mushrooms you identify with certainty. An uncertain batch stays in the forest: mushrooms cannot be made safe by boiling, drying or freezing.
Suspected poisoning? Call the Poison Information Centre at 0800 147 111 (24 h). In an emergency, call 112.
Destroying angel
Amanita virosa
Deadly poisonous. Entirely white, egg-shaped when young, with a volva at the stem base and a ring above. Grows in spruce forests in August–September throughout the country. Confused with cultivated mushrooms and young brittlegills. Symptoms begin only 6–24 hours later, and liver damage develops slowly.
Death cap
Amanita phalloides
Deadly poisonous, rare in Finland: found on Åland and around Turku and Uusimaa. Olive-green or yellowish-grey cap, with a volva and a ring. Symptoms 6–24 hours after eating.
Funeral bell
Galerina marginata
Deadly poisonous and common across the country from September to November on decaying wood. Small brown cap (1–5 cm). Confused with sheathed woodtuft and other small brown wood-growing mushrooms – which is why stump mushrooms are not worth picking without certain identification.
Deadly webcap
Cortinarius rubellus
One of our most poisonous species: the kidney-damaging orellanine survives every kind of treatment. Cinnamon-brown, dry-surfaced, with a sharp point at the centre of the cap. Grows in young spruce forests in August–September. It has been confused with the chanterelle. Symptoms appear from 12 hours up to 14 days later, typically after three days.
Untreated false morel
Gyromitra esculenta
Contains gyromitrin, which causes vomiting, diarrhoea and liver damage within 4–12 hours. It is edible only when boiled twice as instructed, and neither the water nor the steam may be used or inhaled.
Sources: Finnish Food Authority (recommended edible mushrooms, false morel handling and warning labels, outdoor sales of vegetables and mushrooms); Finnish Tax Administration (taxation of natural product income); HUS Poison Information Centre; Arktiset Aromit ry; Finnish Meteorological Institute.
Frequently asked questions about mushrooms
When does the mushroom season start in 2026?
Spring false morels and morels appear in May–June. The main season starts in July with chanterelles and runs to November with trumpet chanterelle. The 2026 season started well: chanterelles and boletes were found already in July in Southern and Central Finland.
When can you find chanterelles?
Chanterelles are found from July to October, and the best time is August–September. The first flush comes about two weeks after proper rain, so a dry July pushes the crop into August.
When does trumpet chanterelle grow?
Trumpet chanterelle starts in late August or September and continues into November. It survives a few degrees of night frost, making it the last edible mushroom of the season.
When does the mushroom season start in Northern Finland?
In Northern Finland the season starts about 2–3 weeks later than in the south, in practice in August, and runs into October. In Lapland the gap can reach three weeks.
May I pick mushrooms on someone else's land?
Yes. Wild mushrooms are covered by everyone's rights, so you may pick them without the landowner's permission, including for sale. Yards, cultivated land and plantings are excluded, and nature reserves have their own restrictions.
Can I sell mushrooms I picked myself tax-free?
Yes, when you sell wild mushrooms you picked yourself as they are. Cleaning, sorting and packing keep the exemption. Dried, frozen or otherwise processed mushrooms are taxable income, as is picking done as paid work.
Which mushrooms must be parboiled?
Milk caps and other bitter species are parboiled for 5–10 minutes and the water is poured away. Saffron milk caps are mild and need no parboiling. False morel is boiled twice for at least 5 minutes. Chanterelle, trumpet chanterelle, black trumpet, sheep polypore and hedgehog mushroom need no parboiling – but all mushrooms are cooked.
How do I recognise a poisonous mushroom?
There is no single sign – you have to know the species. Learn the destroying angel, death cap, funeral bell and deadly webcap first, and leave behind anything you are unsure about. If you suspect poisoning, call the Poison Information Centre at 0800 147 111.
Where can I buy fresh Finnish mushrooms?
On Willit mushrooms are bought straight from the picker and the small producer: the listing shows the harvest date, the region and the price, and you collect the batch from a pickup point or agree delivery with the seller. This page shows, species by species, what is on sale right now.
Order the harvest fresh – straight from the forager
Willit connects the foragers, fishers and small producers of the North with you. See what's in season near you right now, and order it fresh to your home or pickup point.
