Diana Austin commented: If I had to venture a guess I'd say they are a member of the Amanita family. This genus of mushroom has some of the more toxic kinds known. ( ie death angles and death caps) The smaller mushrooms look similar to Amanita cokeri, and those will grow under conifers. They are poisonous. Amanitas have very bulbous bases just at/ under the soil level. Its the upturned caps that are throwing me on the bigger ones, as many members of the russula family have those. Either way, I would not attempt to eat them. I tend to avoid all toadstools and white mushrooms as there are too many poisonous look alikes. Hopefully someone with more experience can chime in. To better identify have them take a spore print. Rest the cap under a piece of tin foil overnight and see what color spore it has.
By Bob Weaver
There they were, right along the road between Rocksdale and Richardson (the lower West Fork of the Little Kanawha) in the Marvin and Peggy Stemple yard, strange anomalies of toadstools or mushrooms, observed by my keen backwoods eye.
The biggest fungi critters appeared to be reverse mushrooms, a cavity on top that seemed to be a catch basin for small critters, while the rounded ones seemed to be fanciful creatures of mother nature.
They also had the appearance of "Fairy Dancing Circles."
The cavity mushrooms had shed an outer covering, which sank to the ground around the stem.
They were all sprouting under a Hemlock tree, which gave them an eerie flavor.
See 2012: 'FAIRY DANCING CIRCLES' AT COUNTY PARK - Mushrooms Springing During Moist Summer
And ODDITY: GIANT CALHOUN PUFFBALL HAD 7 TRILLION SPORES
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