Here's which mushrooms to avoid in Arizona

PHOENIX — After a week of historic rainfall across the Valley, mushrooms are popping up in parks , lawns, and even along sidewalks. They are a brief burst of life, experts say, that is a natural response to the moisture and cooler temperatures.

“We’re seeing them now because, as you know, Arizona is dry and hot, and the temperature has cooled a little bit, and we just got a historic amount of rain. They love the moisture, and they like those slightly cooler temperatures,” said Mike Dechter, executive director of the Arizona Mushroom Society.

Mushrooms are not new arrivals, Dechter said. Instead, they are the reproductive bodies of fungi whose living networks—tiny threads in the soil called mycelium—are present year-round. When conditions are right, those networks send up mushrooms to r