Mushroom Cultivation

Types of Mushrooms the Class Encountered 

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-Amanita muscaria/Fly Agaric, orange, red or yellow with white warts on cap, toxic and psychoactive, rich in folklore
-Hebeloma/poisonpie, smells like radish, collects nitrogen from dead animals for their tree partners.
-Mycena haematopus/Bleeding Fairy Bonnet, beautiful tiny wine coloured mushrooms on wood. Stalk bleeds when squeezed. Toxic. Some mycenas are bioluminescent.
-Chondrostereum purpureum/Silver Leaf Fungus, thin purple parchment bracket, parasitic on deciduous trees, used in forestry to prevent stumps from sprouting.
-Lycoperdon sp./Puffballs, edible when white inside, styptic when dry. Associated with the cosmos in many FN cultures.
-Honey Mushrooms/Armillaria, tree parasite that grows huge networks of reddish black rhizomorphs (mycelial cords) which are bioluminescent, edible when cooked, highly variable in appearance, possible ally against creosote rail ties. Clustered to scattered growth on or near wood, white spore print, stalk with tougher, darker rind and pale, pithy inside. Veil when young, often disappearing.
-Fried Chicken Mushroom/Lyophyllum decastes, big clusters on ground (not on wood) with greasy feeling brown-grey caps, white stalks, pale gills. Mild taste, edible. Related to cultivated shimeji mushrooms of Asia. We did spore slurry with them.
-Granny’s Nightcap/Cortinarius caperatus , distinctively wrinkled orange brown cap, atop cream coloured stalk with a membranous ring. Edible
-Russula-like Waxy Cap/Hygrophorus russula or R. erubescens, beautiful pinkish reddish, slimy, edible but not excellent
-Chaga/Inonotus obliquus, very slow growing parasite on birch. Simmered tea is antioxidant and anti cancer but also high in oxalates. Overharvested in some areas. Can be rebrewed many times.
-Phellinus tremulae/Aspen Conk, heat rotter of live aspens, good for carrying fire
-Turkey Tail/Trametes versicolor, anticancer, immune modulating. Enzymes capable of degrading many toxic chemicals. Performed best in local creosote trials. Grows on most wood types, extremely common worldwide.
-Cortinarius/webcaps, common genus of mycorrhizal filled mushrooms with rusty spores and cobwebby veil. Over a thousand species, only C. caperatus is worth eating. Includes many toxic species including some deadly ones. Red and orange gilled species (section dermocybe) give excellent fluorescent red and orange dyes, historically used by Coast Salish on wool in blankets etc.
-Aureoboletus (Boletus) mirabilis/Admirable Bolete, choice edible with velvety dark brown cap, club shaped brown stalk streaked or marbled with yellow and red, pores yellow to olive green. Associates with Hemlock and rotten wood. Lemony flavour. Often accompanied by Wooly Pine Spike.
-Catathelasma imperialis or evanescens/Imperial Cat/Cat’s Paw/Black Pine etc, a look alike to matsutake but harderflesh, grey cap, decurrent gills and smells like grain and/or cucumber.  Edible. Often huge with deeply rooting stalk. Mycorrhizal with conifers
-Birch Boletes/Aspen Boletes/Scaber Stalks/Leccinums, multiple species all with dark scabers on stalk. Edible but just okay, though orange capped species have caused a number of poisonings. Probably safe for most people when cooked for a long time.
-Strap Club / Clavariadelphus ligula, grows in troops in woods, resembling Cordyceps but without the bumps on the upper part. Beige. The larger and oranger C. truncatus/Flat Topped Candy Club is super sweet tasting and makes an excellent dessert.
-Russulas /Brittlegills, easy to recognize as a genus, hard to ID to species. Most edible species are mild tasting when raw; most toxic ones taste spicy/acrid. Commonand important mycorrhizals. Lactarius/Milk Caps are similar but give milk when cut or broken.
-Hericium cirrhatum/Tiered Tooth Fungus, extremely rare relative of Lions Mane. Red listed in Europe. This one is the first recorded occurrence I can find in BC. Only 8 observations of it in Canada posted online, most in Alberta, all on aspen. We cloned it. High food and medicinal value. Induces nerve growth factor. Could be used for habitat protection where found, say if found in a pipeline route. Might be easy to inoculate into standing dead aspens or to inoculate and girdle live trees.
-Purple Fairy Clubs/Alloclavaria purpurea, grows in large groups, sometimes in fairy rings. So cute edible but tiny and watery.
-Western Matsutake/Pine Mushroom, fragrant choice edible prized in Japan and exported en masse. Commercially harvested locally. Mostly grown under moss. Mycorrhizal with pines, hemlocks, Doug firs, oaks. Spicy, musky smell.
-Indigenous Paint Fungus/Echinodontium tinctorium, traditional source of red paint, trade good. Also gives orange dye. Grows on branch stubs of healthy or dead Hemlock and other conifers. A conk with teeth. Interior flesh is brightly coloured but exterior is grey to brown to black.
-Sprit Gummy Bear/Jelly Tooth/Cat’s Tongue/Pseudohydnum gelatinosum, translucent whitish, small , shaped like an oyster mushroom but with teeth instead of gills. Grows on downed wood from twigs to logs. Edible, even raw, like forest floor flavoured gummy bears. Pleasant texture, mild flavour, refreshing. This and other jelly fungi, like Witch’s Butter, Orange Jelly etc, used by Quw'utsun as a refresher in the days before water bottles, called Shmut’kw in Hul’quimi’num (from Luschiim’s Plants, book by Luschiim Arvid Charlie and Nancy Turner). Jelly fungi also used in Traditional Chinese medicine for cooling and drying actions. Soothing to mucus membranes.
-Artist Conk/Ganoderma applanatum group, perennial conks with white pore surface that stains brown upon contact. Can grow for decades in some cases. Medicinal, with similar properties to their cousin Reishi.