I HAVE always been fascinated by fungi and because a reasonably mild, wet autumn provides the best conditions for finding them, I’m gearing myself up to go foraging.
They’re such amazing organisms. They’re not plants but occupy one of the five kingdoms of taxonomy all to themselves. One of the principal differences between a plant and a fungus is that a fungus doesn’t need light to grow.
Of course what I’ll be searching for are mushrooms and toadstools, which are the fruits of the fungus. The main body of the organism is underground or in some substance like rotting wood and normally consists of a spreading network of fine threads called mycelia.
These can be enormous – if you want a bit of trivial information which could come in handy in a pub quiz, the largest living organisms are fungi – larger than blue whales, larger than giant redwood trees.
Possibly the biggest ever discovered is in the Blue Mountains of Eastern Oregon. It’s a member of the Armillaria or ‘honey fungus’ family which are not popular with Irish gardeners because they sometimes kill ornamental trees, particularly flowering cherries. The one in Oregon covers 2,200 acres, according to the Forest Service of the US Department of Agriculture, and is estimated to be 2,400 years old.
There are several thousand species of fungus in Ireland and their mushrooms and toadstools come in a dazzling variety of different shapes, sizes and colours. There’s actually no scientific difference between a mushroom and a toadstool but the convention is that we use the word mushroom to describe the edible species and toadstool for the others.
Of these others there is a very small number that are deadly poisonous – meaning that if you eat even a relatively small amount you will die and there’s little or nothing that a medical intervention will do to help. These species are rather rare but I have found and identified several of them locally, which means you need to be very careful.
A rather larger number of species are capable of making you unwell, and some of the symptoms are quite unusual. As everyone knows, there are several Irish species that are hallucinogenic. The best known one is the Liberty Cap, a small grassland species that’s a member of the psilocybe family. A couple of years ago Mary Harney banned the sale of this species in Ireland.
The Common Ink Cap has an even odder property. It’s good to eat, unless you drink alcohol at the same time, in which case it makes you violently ill. It has been used to cure alcoholics. The Ink Cap family gets its name from the fact that in the past a very fine quality drawing ink used to be made from the juice in the over-ripe caps.
Despite all this, wild fungi can provide some of the most delicious taste sensations of any foods.
But there are no sure-fire rules for telling the edible ones from the others. You just have to be quite sure you know what species you’re cooking. The best way to do this is to go out with an expert. There are organised ‘fungal forays’ in several parts of the country every autumn. A local Naturalists’ Field Club will probably help you track one down.
And, of course, you don’t have to eat the fungi. You can just admire the brilliant colours and strange shapes. But if you do pick them, always leave a few to ripen fully and spread their spores so that there’s another crop next autumn.
* dick.warner@examiner.ie
a d v e r t i s e m e n t
This appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Monday, September 07, 2009
