Well if your talking about finding and picking wild mushrooms, if you picking mushrooms that u think are magic just from a description on what they look like you may end up dead. First, most magic mushrooms only grow in certain areas, and this page on the shroomery shows u which magical shrooims grow in ur area -http://www.shroomery.org/8461/Which-mushrooms-grow-wild-in-my-area Next, once you know which shrooms grow in your area, search them all up (the shroomery is by far the best place). Some of them, though they can be found in your area are very rare and are not worth looking for. So once you know which shrooms are common in your area and are magic, then look them up and know how to id them (again mostly on the shroomery). Now keep on learning how to i.d. them and once you think you found them take them to your house and try to positively i.d. them, not off by heart but looking on the interet still. Only eat them if you are 100% percent sure or else you may end up very sick or dead. Most magic shrooms (not all) turn blue where you bruise them. Keep in mind not all do but most do and even some poisonous shrooms bruis blue (not that many though).
And keep in mind even if you follow what i told u, it is not 100% safe though. It is safer to just buy some shrooms first but some of us dont have hookups and shit so yeah.
Lab caps are your best bet. It's a guarenteed trip and you don't have to worry about poison caps. The good ones usually have a brownish of golden cap with gray or blue/purple/gold stems. You know you've hit jackpot when you get the ones that look like little pieces of teh vermiculite are growing out of the cap.
There are tons of different strains. Check http://www.shroomery.org/ and for individual strains look at http://www.spores101.com/.