Mushroom Victim Tribute

One woman has died and another is seriously ill in hospital after they ate toxic Death Cap mushrooms which were picked on a trip to a botanical garden.

The mushrooms were gathered by the surviving victim, a woman in her 20s, on Sunday during a day out with her husband to the Ventnor Botanic Gardens on the Isle of Wight.

She ate them together with the second victim, a female relative in her 40s, the following day.

Police were called to an address in Newport on the island at 7am yesterday morning, where they found the older woman dead.

Minutes later, emergency services were called to a second Newport address just over a mile away, where they found the younger woman gravely ill.

She was rushed to St Mary's Hospital, in Newport, where she is said to be stable and conscious.

She told police that she and her relative had both eaten wild mushrooms. Police searched her home and found some left over, which were sent for tests.

The mushrooms were identified as the deadly Death Cup species, which contain more than 20 different toxic chemicals and are responsible for 90 per cent of all mushroom-related deaths worldwide.

In a statement released by Ventnor Botanic Gardens, a spokesman said the recent wet weather had provided the perfect growing conditions for all types of mushrooms.

"While the circumstances are currently being investigated, it appears a large quantity of wild mushrooms - including the toxic Death Cap mushroom - were collected from the vicinity of Ventnor Botanic Garden earlier this week and subsequently eaten," he said.

"The Death Cap mushroom is not cultivated by Ventnor Botanic Garden - no mushrooms or fungi form part of displays - but is believed to have been growing wild in the 22-acre site."

Police Inspector Colin Hall said: "Officers have been told these mushrooms have not been passed on to any other people, but I'm appealing to anyone who picks wild mushrooms without expert knowledge not to eat them."

The incident comes just two weeks after the author Nicholas Evans - who wrote The Horse Whisperer - and three of his family fell ill after eating wild mushrooms.

The 58-year-old was on holiday in the Scottish Highlands with wife Charlotte, 50, her brother, Sir Alistair Gordon-Cumming, 54, and his wife, Lady Louise, 46.

The group all ate Cortinarius speciosissimus, a rare species nicknamed "destroying angels" for their ability to cause renal failure. The four were rushed to hospital, where they received dialysis and other kidney treatment.