About the project

About Me

My name is Jonatha Anselmi, and I was born in Piacenza (Italy) on June 6, 1980. In terms of porcini mushrooms (aka pennybuns, king bolete, ...), my homeland is the Val d'Aveto, which I was lucky enough to discover as a child from Salsominore (province of Piacenza) to Barbagelata (province of Genova).

The porcini mushroom adventures of my grandfather, my father's stories, and the rivalry with "uncle and cousin" have left unforgettable memories in me. These moments shaped my great passion for porcinis, the forest, and, more generally, nature.

My father and I always enjoyed "challenging" each other: our game was to see if one of us could spot the porcini mushroom that the other had found. We did this every time a mushroom was particularly well camouflaged.

Without a doubt, my father's approach transferred in me the playful aspect of mushroom searching, favoring quality over quantity. He always talked about the importance of having what he called "colpo d'occhio", let's call it keen observation. We may translate this as the intuition or the ability to spot hidden porcinis.

And it is precisely from here that the idea of BoletusGame was born: to share this game with all porcini mushroom enthusiasts and to train, indeed, the skill of keen observation.

Monte Penna Forest (Ge), October 17, 2017.

The Project

In 2014, I created BoletusGame from scratch. Although I am not a professional of web development and technologies, my background in computer engineering allowed me to develop the game, website, graphics, photos, logo, texts, and social media channels while also tackling challenges related to legal aspects, hosting, and much more. It was a huge commitment, but without an equally great passion, none of this would have been possible.

Currently, BoletusGame registers traffic peaks of up to 1,000 visits per day, confirming that the game is well appreciated. I have been invited to bring the game in paper version to the Italian monthly magazine Passione Funghi Tartufi, where the BoletusGame column has been published in several issues. I often receive messages like: "My 9-year-old son and I have so much fun clicking on the hidden porcini mushrooms in your game!" As a father of three children, reading these messages touches me deeply.

Even though BoletusGame involves costs that users may not perceive, I have chosen to keep it completely free. For me, it is a small way to contribute to society and offer a moment of well-being. I consider this opportunity a privilege. Spending five minutes exploring a 360-degree photo can evoke, even for just a moment, the feeling of being in the forest.

Anecdotes and Curiosities

Some behind-the-scenes facts:

Easter Sunday during the lockdown year (due to Covid). I access the game, and the server doesn't respond. I reload the page, and the browser shows the hourglass. Ten seconds pass, and nothing. Okay, I start to suspect something... I log in via terminal, check the outgoing traffic... and boom! Server overloaded! Too many visitors, and the server can't handle the traffic. Panic, but suddenly I feel happy: during a difficult time, I managed to make the lockdown a little less boring for someone.
Almost all the photos in our game were taken in Val d'Aveto. The chestnut and oak forests are in Salsominore, Tornarezza, Casale, Casella, and Boschi. The fir forests are in the Monte Penna, Aiona, and Canto Moro forests. The beech forests are in the municipalities of Rezzoaglio and Santo Stefano d'Aveto.
June 2014. I developed all the website code, and it's ready to go online. What holds me back are the photos: I only have 24, with all the porcini hidden and ready to be found! The previous season, I didn’t have this project in mind, so I hadn't prepared enough photos. But I'm not worried because normally, aestivalis mushrooms appear in June in Val d'Aveto. Well, not in 2014. That year was one of the worst: after several seasons where mushrooms were even sold for €1/kg, in 2014, boletus simply didn't grow—I found only about ten all season! So no photos for another year! But seriously, in 2014 they had to disappear, or in 2014 I had to come up with BoletusGame? Oh well, luckily, I met Angela, who saved me by sending me some photos.

Acknowledgments

I want to thank all the people who have contributed and continue to contribute to making BoletusGame what it is today.

In particular, I would like to thank:

My wife Daiana, who has been incredibly patient with me. Of course, time spent on this project is time taken away from other things...
My father Claudio, who often sends me live photos from the forest. These go directly to the various social media channels.
Benni, who helped me with social media management in the early stages of the project. Such great memories, even on New Year's Eve!
All the people who send me photos, allowing me to enrich the various social media channels.