Book of The Day #2

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BOOK OF THE DAY #2

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Mycelium Running is a manual for the mycological rescue of the planet. That’s right: growing more mushrooms may be the best thing we can do to save the environment, and in this groundbreaking text from mushroom expert Paul Stamets, you’ll find out how.

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"There are more species of fungi, bacteria and Protozoa in a single scoop of soil than their are species of plants and vertebrae animals in all of North America. And of these, fungi are the grand recyclers of our planet, the mycomagicians dissembling large organic molecules into simpler forms, which in turn nourish other members of the ecological community. Fungi are the interface organism between life and death.

With each footstep on a lawn, field or forest floor, we walk upon vast sentient cellular membranes. Fine cottony tuffs of mycelium channel nutrients from great distances to form fast growing mushrooms. Mycelium, constantly on the move, can travel across landscapes up to several inches a day to weave a living network over the land. But mycelium benefits our environment far beyond simply producing mushrooms fit our consumption.

Humans collaborate with these cellular networks, using fungi, specifically using mushroom mycelium as spawn, for both short and long term benefits. Mushroom spawn lets us recycle garden waste, wood, and yard debris, thereby creating mycological membranes that heal habitats suffering from poor nutrition, stress, and toxic waste. In this sense, mushrooms emerge as environmental guardians in a time critical to our mutual evolutionary survival. Our fungal friends equip us with tools to act responsibly and repair our shared environment, leading the way to habitat recovery. So knowing how to work with fungi - by custom pairing fungal species with plant communities - is critical for our survival. The twenty first century may be remembered as the Biotech Age, when these kinds of mycotechnologies play a prominent and increasing role in strengthening habitat health."

- excerpt from 'Mycelium Running' by Paul Stamets