Quick guide
How to use micomapa
Everything you can do with the map, in five minutes. And what you can expect from it, with no small print.
1 Pick your mushroom and see where it is stirring
In the top left corner you choose the species. The map colours in the next two weeks zone by zone: grey while the forest is asleep, yellow when it starts to stir, red when the moment has come.
- A heat map. The colour blends from one zone into the next and shows at a glance where the flush is heading.
- Map, relief or satellite. Relief brings out the shady slopes and the valleys. Satellite shows you the real forest.
2 Move through the days
With the slider, or the arrow keys on your keyboard, you can run through the next fifteen days. If an area lights up a little more each day, a flush is on its way: that is the signal you are looking for. If it fades, either you are too late or cold weather is coming.
The first few days are the most reliable. Further ahead, watch the trend rather than the exact number.
3 Click on a zone
Its card opens, with everything you need to decide whether to go:
- the verdict for the day, and which day will be its best;
- the curve for the two weeks, to see whether it is rising or falling;
- what it is missing or has too much of: whether there has been enough rain, whether the ground is holding on to the moisture, whether it is too cold or too warm;
- whether mushrooms have been found around there before, and at what time of year;
- the nearest town, to help you get your bearings.
On a phone it goes step by step, so the map is never covered up: if you are zoomed out, the first tap takes you closer; once you are close, each tap shows a one-line summary above the panel, with the score and the town, and View opens the full card.
- ✓ In full season
- ✓ 40 mm of rain fell on 27 August, a proper soaking; the ground is still damp
- ✓ The soil is just right (16 °C)
- – Fair woodland for this mushroom
4 Find your town
On a computer, type the name of a town into the search box. On a phone, or if you are already out in the woods, press Where am I: the map takes you to your zone and shows you how it is doing. If your phone knows exactly where you are, a blue dot marks the spot.
5 Read the weekend report
Every week we publish the weekend report: where it is worth going on Saturday and Sunday, and over long weekends too, species by species and province by province.
- Palacios del Sil · chanterelles high, best on Saturday
- Villablino · chanterelles and bronze boletes medium
- Barjas (Lugo) · chanterelles medium
6 Get to know each mushroom
Every species has its own page: when it comes out, in which woods, what it needs to appear, how to recognise it and where it is ready this week in each province. Start with the saffron milk cap or porcini.
7 Keep it on your phone
micomapa installs like an app, with no app store and no sign-up. It opens straight onto the map. If you want to see more of the map, fold the bottom panel away with the handle at its top: it shrinks to a single line with the mushroom and the day.
- iPhone: in Safari, the Share button and then Add to Home Screen.
- Android: in Chrome, the ⋮ menu and then Install app.
8 Ask your assistant
If you use a digital assistant, ask it: ‘Will there be saffron milk caps in Berga next week?’ It can read our forecast directly, with nothing for you to install.
What you can expect
- A new forecast every morning
- With the latest weather for every zone.
- More reliable the closer it gets
- The next few days rest mostly on the rain that has already fallen; the last ones, on the weather forecast. Trust the trend.
- Areas, not secret spots
- We talk about zones of about five kilometres. Within them, what you know about the ground is what counts: the shady slope, the clearing, the old pine.
- Conditions, not guarantees
- Red means the weather looks like the weeks that lead up to a good flush. Whether someone got there before you is something nobody can know.
- Grey tells you something too
- If your mushroom is grey, the forest is not ready. You save yourself the trip.
- Checked against real finds
- We test the forecast against thousands of finds from past seasons and correct it where it went wrong. Some species are easier to anticipate than others, and we keep fine-tuning it every season.
- Your eye decides
- We do not identify mushrooms. If in doubt, leave it. More in our notices.
The colours on the map
- Asleep · Not yet
- Low · Starting to stir
- Medium · Could be something
- High · Good time
- Very high · This is the moment