The most common morel in Connecticut is the “blonde” or “yellow” morel. They are a mycorrhizal fungus that grows in association with a variety of different trees. While I know several people who have had great luck searching under dying Elm trees in the forest, I have only found them under fruit trees in more rural areas. As you can see in the photos below, they blend in quite well even against the contrasting colored backdrop of the grass. I suspect my eyes just cannot spot them in the forest where they blend in even better. Their season is short, only in the spring when the earliest spring flowers are starting to bloom. (daffodils, dandelions, trilliums). There was once believed to be another species of morel called a Gray Morel, but as it turns out, those are just younger blonde morels. All the photos below are of the same three mushrooms at different stages of growth. You can see in the first photo a mushroom that in the past would have been called a gray, in later photos grows to become the commonly known blonde morel.
