Are Mushrooms Truly Magical
Introduction: A series on the mysteries of fungi
Back in 2005, I got invited on a mushroom hunt. It was a drizzly fall day in the Luberon of Southern France. I clambered into an acquaintance's minivan along with six French mycophiles who acted like giddy school children boarding a field trip bus. Crammed together in a micro-van ironically named Renault Espace, we meandered down a winding country road, the hilltop villages veiled in fog and mist. We were headed deep into a forest of green oaks and chestnuts.
Without warning, the front passenger pointed off into the distance and yelled something in French. My friend sitting next to me grabbed my hand and winked in anticipation. The van violently lurked to the side of the road, and the passengers evacuated like the vehicle was on fire. Seated in the third row, I was last to get out, the minivan pulling away almost before I closed the door. I learned later that the driver was hastily hiding the vehicle lest we give away our location to passers by. By the time I’d collected myself, everyone else, including my friend, had disappeared into the woods.
Alone, cold, and confused, I gripped my shopping bag tight, wondering what signal I had missed. What step had I not seen? Had I been late to our mushroom mission briefing?
Fortunately, the driver–who had properly obscured the vehicle behind some tall shrubs–motioned to me as he hustled towards the trees. “We look for the châtaignier.”
I followed sheepishly behind him, assuming the chataignier was some kind of mushroom, probably related to the chanterelle, right? I kept looking down, my eyes peeled for our prey. But instead, my guide was looking straight ahead and walking rather briskly. How could he possibly see mushrooms moving that fast? How big were they in France?
We disappeared deeper into the forest. The light dimmed as the canopy grew thick, and the air moist and cold. The leaves were heavy on the ground, draped over fallen logs and rocks, like sodden quilts of auburn, sienna, and umber. Bright green moss clung to tree trunks.
“Here we are,” he said as he stopped at the base of a towering Chestnut tree. It had already lost its leaves in a shower of burgundy, apricot and saffron that presented a bright autumnal ring around its base.
“Look. The ground.” My foraging friend—let’s call him Jacques—was now bent over and meticulously searching the soil, poking discreetly with his walking stick. I now realized that the chataignier was the tree, not the fungi. Chestnut in English. We were close. And our prey was lurking somewhere between these exposed roots.
Suddenly, like a magic trick performed many times before, Jacques flipped up a mat of rotten forest floor with his stick, revealing a tiny clutch of orange-red chanterelles. They looked like a little family of sheltering gnomes.
“Voila!”
Now, that was the only time I’ve ever heard a Frenchman use the word “voila” outside of a movie. But, I have to admit, it was appropriate for the moment.
For the next half hour, I tried to mimic Jacques’ every move, flipping up leaves and toeing at the dirt. But, despite my best efforts, I had only unearthed a few slugs. Meanwhile, Jacques continued to conjure batch after batch of chanterelles. I was beginning to think his stick was some kind of fungal divining rod harnessing dark forest magic as handful after handful of mushrooms filled his IKEA bag.
Taking a breather from his happy hunting, Jacque looked at my empty bag and took pity. He came uncomfortably close to me until I noticed his unwieldy salt and pepper eyebrows and tobacco-stained front teeth. In a hushed voice, he whispered a few words of advice.
“But don’t tell anyone,” he said with eyes so serious that–to this day–I haven’t shared his suggestions with another soul.
But, it was good advice. Like a light switch, the mushrooms started to appear. Within a few minutes, I’d filled half my shopping bag.
Then a shout came from the other side of the woods. Out of sight, the forest responded with enthusiastic cheers.
“Trompette de la mort!!!” Came the shout again, like the horn call of a fox hunt announcing the chase.
The sound of boots scurrying through leaves filled the forest air. I looked around confused again, but this time I didn’t want to be left behind, so I started running full steam toward the call. Jacques tried to keep up, but his overflowing bag of fungus was slowing his progress. Were we running to someone’s aid? Fleeing an angry landowner? Was this some form of French adult hide and seek?
I arrived in a clearing with the entire hunting party circling someone on the ground. It was a woman kneeling to examine a small charcoal gray, petal-like object that was almost invisible in her hand against the leaf litter. Upon closer inspection, I recognized that she was holding the black horn-shaped Craterellus cornucopioides, which the French sometimes call Trumpets of Death, and the less morbid and less imaginative Americans simply call Black Trumpets. Despite their foreboding name, these fungi are some of the most delicious out there. And as my eyes wandered to the ground around our feet, I noticed similar black growths everywhere. We had stumbled upon a bumper crop.
At first, the group gave the spotter ample time to take her fill. She grabbed several handfuls before standing and wiping the mud from her pants. This was taken as a signal for the rest of us to charge in. It was like a feeding frenzy. Everyone was hoping to get the most of these rich, earthy mushrooms. The friend who had invited me was pulling handfuls of chanterelles from her bag and shoving them into her coat pockets, making room for the prized, and more delicate, black trumpets.
After only a few moments, the prey substantially depleted, the other hunters began heading back to the minivan, chatting and slapping backs in celebration. I lingered, making a mental note of the trees, the light, the ground, hoping I’d remember some details for a future hunt of my own.
By the time I returned to the Renault, it was running, and some of the hunting party were already warming up inside. Others were finishing celebratory cigarettes. The driver motioned me toward the open back hatch. There were six bags overflowing with wild mushrooms. The earthy umami smell was intoxicating.
I pointed at a small cardboard box with a lid. "Qu'est-ce que c'est?" I asked.
The driver, the butt of a cigarette clinched between his teeth, reached in and slid the lid back.
“Cepes, the king of all champignon,” he whispered with dramatic effect. “I believe you call this porcini after the Italian.”
“Will we eat them tonight?”
“No, I will sell these to pay for the petrol.”
The world of fungi is one of the most fascinating out there. Yet, until recently, my knowledge of mushrooms was exclusively culinary; and other than a couple of “wild” foraging experiences, entirely of the cultivated variety. Yet fungi’s role on Earth goes well beyond the dining table. They’re downright essential to our ecosystem. Fungi may even hold solutions to many of our human problems: pollution, mental health, world hunger. We’re quite literally only scratching the surface in terms of the role and benefits of these reclusive and peculiar creatures.
That’s why I was delighted to recently reconnect with an old college classmate who has spent her life exploring these very questions. She’s a mycologist. That’s a biologist who studies fungi for us lay people. Over the next several weeks, I’m looking forward to summarizing some of our fascinating conversation and further exploring fungi as food, as medicine, and as industry. So let’s get started!
Rachel Linzer, PhD, has a kind face and a pleasant voice. She’s been studying fungi and mushrooms for more than twenty years, but modestly discourages the title of “expert.” Rachel speaks deliberately and precisely while answering each of my questions, as you might expect of a researcher who has spent decades in the lab. But as we go deeper into the world of fungi, Rachel relaxes a bit, and exudes a natural enthusiasm and excitement for her life’s work. This woman is very fond of fungus.
“On my first day of class in graduate school..the fungi were just absolutely charismatic,” Rachel explained in the first few minutes of chatting. “They broke all the rules, and [had] all these wacky lifestyles.” I might have thought she was talking about some life-of-the-party friend we both envied in college. But then I realized she was serious. She described a fungus as “charismatic.”
And she’s not wrong.
Fungi make up the third kingdom of organisms on our planet, after plants (flora) and animals (fauna). These remarkable creatures range from microscopic yeasts that ferment beer or make your sourdough rise, to the 2,300 acre honey fungus in Oregon’s Blue Mountains, named the largest organism on Earth. Fungi love dark, moist spots, but they can also be found almost everywhere on the planet, from the arctic to the deepest reaches of the ocean. They are the great recyclers of our ecosystems, experts at breaking down organic matter and building soil.
So what’s the difference between a mushroom and a fungus, I ask.
“The mushroom is like the apple on an apple tree.” explains Rachel. The “tree,” called the mycelium, is actually made up of hundreds of tendril-like hyphae that weave together into a solid mass.” Much of the mycelium is hidden below ground, but it’s this organ that is responsible for the majority of fungal activity. Mushrooms are just a reproductive piece of this larger “tree.”
However, the similarities between trees and fungi ends there. Most fungi actually breathe oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide, the opposite of trees. Unlike plants that are made up of cellulose, mushroom cells are made with chitins, a compound common in the exoskeletons of crustaceans and insects. Fungi even store their energy like animals, in the form of glycogen, rather than starch, the more common plant energy storage.
“We are more related to the mushrooms on our pizza, then we are to the tomatoes.” Rachel clarifies. Fungi and animals are much more closely related than plants.
Low and behold, fungi are also omnivores in a way. Unlike plants that make their own food through photosynthesis, fungi have to “hunt.” Many mushrooms feast on dead plants and animals, breaking them down and returning important nutrients to the soil.
Other fungi are pathogens. This means they act more like diseases or infections. Some snack on live plants and animals without harming them too much, think the fungus that causes athlete’s foot. Others are a little nastier.
The Ophiocordyceps species infect ants and take over their central nervous system. The resulting zombie ant leaves their colony, finds a fungus-friendly spot (say the underside of a nearby leaf), and waits there to die. When ready, the fungus grows a fruiting body that breaks through the ant’s head and releases spores into the air to start the process all over again. Nice, right?
But don’t worry. Some fungi are almost altruistic in their appetites, helping organisms like plants and trees better metabolize their own food. Others are so cooperative, that they develop symbiotic relationships–the best example being lichen–where neither organism could survive on its own without collaboration.
“Wait, lichen are two organisms, not one?” I ask Rachel for clarification. “Those little plants found on rocks?”
“Two or more!” Rachel elaborates. “They are typically a fungus and an algae.”
And that’s just the beginning.
In fact, there are endless mysteries about fungi and mushrooms. They breathe life into barren landscapes, repair crumbling ecosystems, and might hold the keys to sustainable agriculture. With their medicinal magic, they heal the body, rewire the brain, offer solace in times of affliction. As food, they are full of culinary delights, and can be used as biofactories, producing much needed enzymes and food additives. There are even mycelium meat alternatives, of which I’ll try a few. In industry, mushrooms are being used to make building materials, textiles, leather, and objects essential for space travel. Fungi even have a role in art and fashion.
There really isn’t any limit to what they might do. Are you ready to explore this kingdom together?
Stick with me over the next couple of weeks, as I expand further on the world of mushrooms and fungi, their delicious contribution to cuisine, and their myriad other applications and uses, including medical, industrious, construction, art and even space.
Super interesting stuff Steve!