Newspaper Article about Paul Stamets

Article about Paul Stamets from the Montana Standard newspaper.

The article is very good and touchs on the inspiration that Paul can create.

Can mushrooms save the world?

Monday Musings

By Roberta Stauffer, Standard opinion page editor – 03/16/2009

roberta-stauffer 

Roberta Stauffer, Standard Opinion Page Editor

Paul Stamets speaks for the fungi family, much as Jane Goodall speaks for the chimps and the Lorax speaks for the trees.

 

I caught an interview with him on Montana Public Radio’s New Dimensions program a few months back. The mushrooms couldn’t have picked a better spokesperson (if they could pick, that is).
And to hear Stamets talk, maybe they did pick him, for they’re capable of spectacular feats.
Did you know, for example, that fungi discovered in the aftermath of Chernobyl were found to take in radiation and turn it into energy much like green plants convert light energy for their own use through photosynthesis?
And did you know mushrooms can break down nasty by-products of industrial processing? “Mycoremediation,” Stamets calls it, and it works on such pollutants as dioxins, PCBs, petroleum waste and nerve gas toxins. Think of them as “little Pac-men that go around gobbling up toxic molecules,” he said during the Monday night radio show.
Mushrooms themselves aren’t the Pac-men, but rather their “parents,” the mycelium. In a recent Mother Earth News article, Stamets describes mycelium as a “network of fungal cells” that pretty much permeates the Earth. Mushrooms are the fruits of this complex network.

Stamets’ latest book is called “Mycelium Running: How mushrooms can help save the world,” but he’s worried that much of this intricate network may be wiped out before we humans have a chance to discover even a fraction of what it has to offer. He lives in Washington and is particularly concerned over disappearance of species in old growth rainforests of the Pacific Northwest.

Besides environmental cleanup benefits, mushrooms hold promise as medicines. Stamets has discovered antiviral and antibacterial properties in fungi in his lab and thinks they could potentially treat inflictions such as bird flu, HIV, cancer and smallpox.

Stamets’ list of possible applications goes on: mushrooms for water filtration, mushroom-based “myconol” fuel for automobiles, eating mushrooms to stay healthy, spiritual properties of mushrooms. If you wish to enhance in the spiritual real, https://www.peninsuladailynews.com/national-marketplace/free-psychic-reading-online-4-best-psychic-sites-that-will-help-you-face-your-challenges-in-2021/ is your best friend to get guided messages and predictions.

He decries “myco-phobic” cultures such as the English who came up with the distasteful “toadstool” nickname and celebrates “myco-phyllic” societies like those in Asia and Russia that recognize the rejuvenating role of the humble mushroom.

And of course there’s a Butte connection: a local company owes its very existence to a fungi-based product that it sells it far and wide. The company started out years ago as Mycotech, then it was sold and the name changed to Emerald BioAgriculture. Now it’s called Laverlam International Corp.

Located in the industrial park south of Butte, the company cultivates a fungus called Beauveria bassiana and processes it into a natural insecticide.

Gary Chatriand, vice president of manufacturing, said the Butte operation employs eight people, and they ship their products all around the world.

“Seventy percent of our sales are international,” Chatriand said.

I was thrilled to learn the company was still up and running. Light industry like this is just what Butte needs.

And it sounds like more respect for and research into mushrooms is just what the world needs now — along with “love sweet love” of course.

— Roberta (Bobbi) Stauffer is The Standard’s opinion page editor. She may be reached at 496-5514 or by e-mail at roberta.stauffer@mtstandard.com.

To download Stamets’ radio show, go to www.newdimensions.org/program.php?id3274. To find out all about his work, visit www.fungi.com. A link to the Mother Earth News article is on that site as well.

Book Review, Mushrooms Demystified

“Mushrooms Demystified”, by David Arora is one of the best identification books for this area.

mushrooms-demystified This book has a thorough description of mushroom terms, features and families. There is even a section on Greek and Latin terms to make the scientific names more understandable. The bible of mushroom books, as it is known, is my most complete identification guide.Paired with Davids companion book, “All the Rain Promises and More” is a powerful tool for learning fungus.

There is a general key in the beginning, to get you in the right family, and then each section has a detailed key that is very straight forward and easy to use.Edibility is covered as well as toxicity and naming history.There is black and white photos throughout the book  and colored plates in the center that are outstanding!There is a section on mushroom toxins with details on the chemicals involved.Symptoms, emergency advice and examples of poisonings are included.

“Mushrooms Demystified” is a great Identification Guide and good way to get an overall understanding of the great world of FUNGUS! Even though it is centered around his home in California it is very effective here in the NorthWest. Go get your copy today…at your local bookstore. Here in Bozeman we are lucky to have Vargo’s on main street.

Oyster Cultivation Update

Checked on the oysters growing on cornstalks, and was excited to see mushrooms forming.

There is a couple of clumps forming and the mycelium has spread throughout. The mass may grow pretty fast now that that the fruiting has started! The timing might workout pretty well since the temperatures are almost stable enough to set the tub outside.

Oysters on cornstalkOysters on cornstalkOysters on cornstalkOysters on cornstalk

It is good to see this working because I didn’t have to put much work into it.There is not much much money invested either. The cornstalks were just broken up enough to fit in the tub and soaked in water. Since it is very low tech and low cost it has real possibilities for farmers, both those farming for a hopeful profit and those farming to provide food to  survive.

The cornstalks could have been bagged up and sent to the landfill, and instead will be turned into food. I will keep you updated on this project.

Under Water Mushroom Discovered

The first I heard of this was from Paul Stamets at Bioneers. Then I found this interesting article at MailTribune.com
What lies beneath: a new mushroom
Hydrologist happens onto a novel gilled species that seems to thrive underwater in the upper Rogue River

A new species of mushroom, dubbed Psathyrella aquatic, has been discovered in the upper Rogue River. Biologists believe this is the first gilled mushroom to be found living underwater in the world. The bubbles on the top of the mushroom are caused by an unknown gas.Photo courtesy of Robert Coffan

Paul Fattig

SHADY COVE — Hydrologist Robert Coffan knew he was looking at something very unusual in the knee-deep summer waters of the upper Rogue River.

Here were gilled mushrooms, swaying in the main current of the clear, cold river in early July through late September.

“But since gilled mushrooms DO NOT live and grow underwater, I was real nervous” about approaching a mycological expert, admitted the adjunct professor at Southern Oregon University.

Indeed, Darlene Southworth, a retired SOU biology professor, was plenty skeptical when he broached the subject. Although she was impressed by underwater photographs taken by Coffan, she wanted to see the evidence firsthand.

Not only did she witness the mushrooms found by Coffan, but she discovered others during an August visit to a stretch of the north fork of the river within a few miles of Woodruff Bridge in the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest.

“There are no known gilled mushrooms living underwater,” Southworth explained. “And this is not a slime mold or anything like that. These are regular gilled mushrooms.

“We believe this is a new species,” she concluded of the mushrooms that are typically about 10 centimeters tall with caps that are about 2 centimeters wide.

The find was unveiled Monday night at the November meeting of the Upper Rogue Watershed Association, for whom Coffan had prepared a water assessment last year.

Dubbed Psathyrella aquatic, the mushroom is being introduced to the broader scientific community in a 14-page paper submitted Nov. 9 to the science journal Mycologia. The paper was written by Coffan in collaboration with Southworth and Jonathan Frank, a laboratory technician at SOU.

Coffan credits Southworth, who now conducts research under a National Science Foundation grant at the university, for focusing on mycorrhizal fungi, and Frank for the paper and much of the research in determining the mushroom’s uniqueness.

Up at Oregon State University, Matt Trappe, a doctoral candidate in forest mycology, says Coffan has found a unique mushroom. He and his father, Jim Trappe, a retired U.S. Forest Service mycologist who now teaches in OSU’s botany and plant pathology department, were consulted on the find.

“As far as we’ve determined, this is a first in Oregon as well as a first in the world,” Matt Trappe said of gilled mushrooms living in water. “We’re not aware of anything at all like this in mycology where the reproductive mushroom structure appears to be perennially underwater.

“If this evolved in Oregon, what are the odds it can be found in streams and rivers around the world?” he asked. “This raises all kinds of questions about spore disbursement and evolution.”

There are more questions than answers at this point, acknowledged Coffan, who originally discovered the water-dwelling gilled mushrooms in summer 2005. None of the mushrooms were found in slack water, he noted.

A DNA analysis at SOU’s Bio Tech Center and a cross-check of references and experts, including mycologists at the University of Minnesota, determined the mushrooms belonged to the genus Psathyrella, Southworth said. Samples were sent to OSU and to San Francisco State University.

There are about 600 known species of Psathyrella, all terrestrial, she said.

“How do we identify them? We look at the morphology — the form, the shape and the DNA,” she said.

It has a small bell-shaped cap, a thin stipe (stem) and gills underneath, she said. They examined the cells in the cap and made a spore print.

Researchers have ruled out the possibility the mushrooms were growing along the banks and were merely submerged by rising waters brought on by snowmelt.

The mushrooms were found in the spring-fed “base” flow of the river, Coffan said, noting that flow is consistent and keeps the mushrooms submerged.

The mushrooms tend to grow on submerged wood but can also be found growing in the gravel, Southworth said.

“These are growing in the same place for three months, ” she said, adding they have been found as late as Sept. 21.

Although there are some known freshwater aquatic fungi, this is the only known gilled mushroom that grows underwater, she reiterated.

“We noticed there is a gas bubble underwater,” she said. “When we pulled the mushroom out, we could hold it up for some seconds before the spore burst. But they would not be uniformly distributed. They would stick to the cap, to the stipe, to Jonathan’s fingers.”

They don’t know what the gas is, she noted.

They are also intrigued by its three-month fruiting season.

“That’s way long for mushrooms,” she observed.

As for their edibility, Southworth figures the waterborne mushrooms are too small to warrant collecting for food.

However, several of the terrestrial Psathyrella are edible, although most have never been tested as a food source, according to her research.

“There is no reason it would go toxic,” she observed of a member of the genus growing in water.

Meanwhile, Coffan, Southworth and Frank plan to return to the area to conduct further research to try to determine the extent of the mushroom’s habitat. They also want to check out other streams in the region for evidence of the mushrooms.

“But it will be next summer before that is feasible,” she said. “Right now we can describe this one river: It’s aerated, cold, clear, steady flow. But we want to find out how the spores are dispersed.”

“And we want to find out how unique the habitat is,” Coffan said. “We have a whole new area to look for mushrooms now. It’s mind-boggling.”

Reach reporter Paul Fattig at 776-4496 or e-mail him at pfattig@mailtribune.com.