Episode 92: Beyond the Fruiting Body - Why Fungi Matter More Than We Think

Dr. Alfredo Justo, curator of botany and mycology at the New Brunswick Museum, unveils the mysterious world beneath our feet - the vast, largely undocumented kingdom of fungi. With backgrounds spanning Spain, the United States, and now Canada, Dr. Justo brings a wealth of expertise to our discussion about the cutting edge of fungal research.

Unlike plants and animals, fungi remain largely enigmatic because we rarely see the actual organisms themselves - only their fruiting bodies (mushrooms) that occasionally emerge. This fundamental challenge has left mycology decades behind other biological sciences. As Dr. Justo explains, studying fungi is like trying to understand plants by only examining their fruits, never seeing the plants themselves.

The conversation explores how DNA sequencing has revolutionized the field, allowing researchers to identify species with unprecedented accuracy. Through initiatives like the Fungal Diversity Survey (FunDIS) and MicroMap Atlantic Canada, scientists and citizen researchers are collaborating to document North America's fungal diversity. With over 70,000 mushroom specimens DNA barcoded so far, we're just beginning to understand the scope of fungal biodiversity.

Beyond taxonomy, we delve into fungi's remarkable potential applications. From mycorrhizal relationships that enhance forest health to bioremediation of contaminated soils, from pre-inoculated trees that produce edible mushrooms to promising medical compounds like those found in chaga and lion's mane, fungi offer solutions to some of our most pressing challenges.

Whether you're a nature enthusiast curious about participating in citizen science, an entrepreneur seeking innovative business opportunities, or simply someone fascinated by the natural world, this episode reveals how fungi connect all living systems. Connect with your local mycological society to join this growing community of mushroom enthusiasts making significant contributions to scientific understanding.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Back in 2016,.
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Speaker 3 (01:12):
As the world gets louder and louder, the lessons
of our natural world becomeharder and harder to hear, but
they are still available tothose who know where to listen.
I'm Jerry Ouellette and I washonoured to serve as Ontario's
Minister of Natural Resources.
However, my journey into thewoods didn't come from politics.

(01:33):
Rather, it came from my time inthe bush and a mushroom.
In 2015, I was introduced tothe birch-hungry fungus known as
chaga, a tree conch withcenturies of medicinal
applications used by Indigenouspeoples all over the globe.
After nearly a decade ofharvest, use, testimonials and

(01:56):
research, my skepticism hasfaded to obsession and I now
spend my life dedicated toimproving the lives of others
through natural means.
But that's not what the show isabout.
My pursuit of this strangemushroom and my passion for the
outdoors has brought me to theplaces and around the people
that are shaped by our naturalworld.

(02:16):
On Outdoor Journal Radio'sUnder the Canopy podcast, I'm
going to take you along with meto see the places, meet the
people.
That will help you find youroutdoor passion and help you
live a life close to nature andunder the canopy.
So join me today for anothergreat episode, and hopefully we

(02:37):
can inspire a few more people tolive their lives under the
canopy.
Under the Canopy Well, good dayall.
As always, we always want tothank our listeners all across
Canada, the states throughoutthe world, whether it's
Switzerland, trinidad, tobago,ghana, caribbean, all those

(03:01):
other places.
We really appreciate youlistening and should you at any
time have any questions or wouldlike to hear any podcasts or
any clarification for anything,just let us know and we'll be
more than happy to do what wecan to get you on the program or
to answer those things.
Now I got to tell you here it is.
It's late April here for therecording, mid-late April, and I

(03:24):
was out this morning with theChocolate Lab gunner checking my
living apothecary, and I wasout to see a number of the wild
leek or ramp patches.
I did some transplanting andstarted a patch a couple years
ago two patches actually, whereI take a gunner out for his run

(03:44):
and one of them seems to havesurvived and doing quite well,
but the other one doesn't seemto be doing so great, so I'll
probably start a new patchsomewhere else in this forest.
Not only that, but the stingingnettle and all the other things
that normally come up arestarting to come up pretty good,
so it's nice to see the groundis softening up a lot of
moisture content, which is good.

(04:04):
So for the indices for the rain, and it's just.
You know, we get a large snowload, but it all depends on how
it melts, indicates how theforest fire impact is going to
be, because if we get a frozenground with a fast melt and it's
all just runoff, nothing seepsinto the ground, but if you get
a slow melt, it seeps into theground and has a deeper moisture
.
Slow melt it seeps into theground and has a deeper moisture

(04:26):
content, which helps fightforest fires and it looks like
it's pretty good for those sortsof things.
Not only that, but I'm out withvolvo here here at the recording
studio and I got my new toythat we're using, trying
something new, a new drone thatwe're going to try and use to

(04:48):
see if we can locate Chaga andthings along that line to make
it a little easier in harvesting, because when you start Chagas
only, as we mentioned before,only about 1 in 10,000 birch
trees will produce one.
You got to look or spend a lotof time looking, and while
there's no leaves on the trees,I've got a drone to start

(05:10):
identifying some locations.
That'll be good for picking andI'm hoping that's going to ease
up things, because we spend alot of time in the bush looking.
I don't mind that, but it getsto be quite demanding at some
point where it's oh look,there's one over there and
that's a kilometer away fromwhere you initially started.
But hopefully this drone willhelp out.
Now today is our special guest.

(05:31):
We have Alfredo Justo on thepodcast.
Well, good morning, alfredo,and thanks for coming on the
podcast.
Good morning, jeremy.
Thanks for having me.
I very much appreciate it.
I know I think a number of yourcolleagues had suggested that
we get together and talk.
It's whether it was Greg Thorneor James Scott or a number of

(05:57):
others, but a lot of greatcontacts.
Now I have to tell you, alfredo, that receiving your
information because we always doquite a bit of research for our
podcasts and one of the thingsthat I found was just like this
is like old school days goingthrough all the reports and the
information, but I found it veryinformative and very
interesting.

(06:17):
So, alfredo, tell us a bitabout yourself, what's your
background, and give us a bit ofunderstanding of who we're
dealing with today.

Speaker 4 (06:26):
I'm a mycologist, so I study mushrooms.
I'm originally from Spain,where I did my undergrad in
biology and eventually my PhD.
Then I moved to the States, toWorcester, Massachusetts, to
Clark University, to do mypostdoc.
That happened at the very endof 2008.

(06:47):
And I spent the last since then.
I've been mostly on this sideof the Atlantic.
For a long time.
I was a postdoc at ClarkUniversity, Then I had a
research position in Mexico fora year, Then eventually we went
back to the States and since2019, I work at the New

(07:08):
Brunswick Museum in St John, NewBrunswick, where I'm the
curator of botany and mycology.

Speaker 3 (07:14):
Oh, very good, so you've been there since for
about six years now, correct,yes, yeah, about six years.
Tell us a bit about what you dothere and what's involved at
this location.

Speaker 4 (07:26):
Well, the New Brunswick Museum is the
provincial museum for NewBrunswick and as such we collect
and preserve and do researchand do interpretation on
everything that relates to thehuman history and the natural
history of New Brunswick and alot of the times also adjacent

(07:50):
regions and as part of thenatural history department.
What we do every day kind ofdepends if we're during field
season or not, because, as youcan guess, with natural history
we do spend a lot of time in thefield when is the time to do
more collections, but when it'stime in the field we spend a lot

(08:13):
of time just collecting.
In my case, mushrooms is at thecenter of my research, but I
also take care again of thebotany and mycology collection,
so that that includes plants,lichens, bryophytes, algae,
anything that is botanical ormycological in any way, and we
also have other colleagues inthe natural history department.

(08:35):
We have a curator of zoologyand then we have a curator of
paleontology, so mostly animalsor fossils.
So we cover all aspects ofnatural history Very interesting
.

Speaker 3 (08:48):
So tell us, how do you find a big difference
between New Brunswick and Spain?

Speaker 4 (08:53):
Well, I'm from northern Spain that's something
that a lot of people have inmind sunny Mediterranean Spain.
I'm from rainy Atlantic Spain.
I'm from the northwest.
I'm from rainy Atlantic Spain.
I'm from the Northwest, justvery close to Portugal, so my
part of Spain is actually prettyrainy.
The climate that we have thereis actually pretty similar to

(09:14):
the Pacific Northwest region ofNorth America.
We do get warmer and driersummers, but it's very rainy.
We get a lot of rain from theAtlantic.
So, as I told you, I've been inNew England for 10 years before
moving to Canada, so that kindof prepared me for the Canadian
winters.

(09:34):
But yeah, no, it's verydifferent, but I see some
similarities.
I see some similarities and,especially, being back on the
Atlantic coast again, myhometown in Spain is right on
the coast in the Atlantic.
So there are some similarities.

Speaker 3 (09:50):
Very interesting.
So when you say the summers arewarmer, how much warmer are
they?

Speaker 4 (09:56):
Well.
Around my hometown we usuallyget between 25 to 30 degrees.
It's not like warm warm insouthern Spain, where you get
these heat waves that you getalso to 40 degrees Celsius.
In my hometown it's warm, butnice warm that it doesn't get

(10:16):
too oppressive and it usuallycools down at night, so that's
very refreshing.
For me, it's the perfectweather.
I really think that northernSpain is a hidden gem that
people haven't found out about,and maybe we want to keep it
that way.

Speaker 3 (10:31):
So yeah, exactly so.
What's the cost of living likethere?
How much does a cup of coffeecost if that's a standard item
that people would have there?
Compared to here.
What's the cost of gas andthings like that?
How is it compared to here?
What's the cost of gas andthings like that?
How is it compared to Canada?

Speaker 4 (10:46):
Well, in general in Europe, gas, you have to
remember, is much more expensivein all of Europe, much more
expensive than in Canada or theStates.
A little cup of coffee, whichis by default espresso, is
probably a euro or somethinglike that.
It's not expensive.
I would say cost of living isnot expensive.

(11:07):
It's pretty much in sync withwhat the salaries are.
I would say, yeah, it's a verygood, nice quality of life, but
it's also a very good nicequality of life here in Canada,
so no complaints either way.

Speaker 3 (11:25):
Yeah, I know, I just wondered.
So you know, because I'm notsure.
I know.
Housing out my way and justeast of Toronto, where I am in
Oshawa, has in the past twodecades has jumped unbelievably.
It's almost cost ineffectivefor youth like my sons to try

(11:46):
and buy a house here.
I don't know whether they'reever going to be able to.
I mean, everybody says thatwhen they first buy their first
house it's the same thing.
But you know, from $175,000 toover a million for the same
house in 20 years.
That's a big jump in my opinion.
And housing the cost of, of,say, housing in in your hometown

(12:07):
in that area, if you know thatkind of sort of thing.

Speaker 4 (12:10):
It's just that the listeners get interested in
hearing some different aspectsfrom around the world and you
happen to be from a part that wehaven't talked a lot about yeah
, no, I mean housing is a bigconcern, I think, in spain and
concern, I think, in Spain, and,as you were saying, the youth
being able to buy their firsthomes.
It has been problematic.

(12:30):
I would say also in Spain thatis not a big tradition of
renting.
You are kind of expected to buyyour house pretty early on.
There is I have seen both whenI was in the States and here in
Canada there is more traditionfor people renting for longer
periods of time.
It has been true in later yearsin Spain, but it's not

(12:52):
traditionally the case.
So access to being able to buyyour first home in Spain is
still.
We have a whole ministrydedicated to just housing.
So that tells you that it is anissue that somebody has to look
after, because you have to makeit easier for people to be able
to access their homes.

Speaker 3 (13:13):
Yeah, Very interesting.
Yeah, so, alfredo, you sent mea bunch of information that I
found interesting and I read itall, such as the 2024, what is
it?
The Fundus Annual Report.
Yes, yeah, go ahead, Tell us abit about the report.
So there's a bunch of things onthere that I want to talk about

(13:38):
.
It talked about in the missionstatement about conservation of
fungi and their habitats,increased public awareness and
equipping and engaging thecommunity to find out more
details about that.

(13:58):
How do we have a conservationof the habitats and fungi and
things like that?

Speaker 4 (14:07):
yeah.
So the 2024 fund, this report,and fund this stands for fungal
diversity survey, which is anon-profit organization in north
america, and this is kind ofthe latest interaction of
something that started about 10to 12 years ago when

(14:27):
professionals of mycology allover North America, but also
citizen scientists all overNorth America and people of
mycological clubs got togetherand said well, we have to really
know which mushroom speciesoccur in North America.
So in the fundus report you canread a lot about the.

(14:47):
This is a 2024 report, so theactivities for 2024.
And I will recommend anybodywho's interested in learning
what is happening with studiesof mushroom diversity in North
America go have a look at thereport.
They really do a great job atsummarizing what they're doing
and the final objective of thefungal diversity survey is to

(15:10):
catalog all mushroom speciesthat occur in North America as
part of the process and also assomething that will help
eventually the project itself toincrease awareness of everybody
about how little we know aboutmushrooms in North America and
also take that knowledge to beable to develop conservation

(15:31):
efforts for the mushrooms.
And that relates really to thehabitats, because long term, the
only real way to deal withthese organisms is going to be
preserving the habitats wherethey live be preserving the
habit.

Speaker 3 (15:45):
That's where they live?
Yeah, because it was.
I found it interesting.
You know that they want toincrease public awareness, which
is good, because I have to tellyou, I have a business that
focuses on Chaga, theinautonomous obliquus, and most
people come in and they'recompletely removed, in Canada at

(16:06):
least, from understanding a lotof the benefits for a lot of
the fungi and the mushrooms, thefruiting body that are out
there, and there's a hugeconcern, as always.
You know I don't want to getinvolved because I don't want to
pick the wrong one.
Involved because I don't wantto pick the wrong one.

(16:28):
So this fundus annual report,it's something that can be found
where and what would be thebenefits to people who are just
starting to learn about variousfungi or the fruiting bodies and
things along that line.

Speaker 4 (16:39):
Yeah, if you just Google fungal diversity survey
or fundus, it will take you tothe landing page and there you
can not only find the reportitself but also background about
the project, background aboutrelated projects and different
efforts that are happeningacross North America to document

(17:01):
fungal diversity.
And I would say this is a typeof effort that really is very
inviting and really welcoming ofeverybody.
It doesn't matter if you're adedicated, you know, citizen
scientist, mycologist thatreally focuses on mushrooms, or
somebody who just casuallyobserves mushrooms from time to
time and you just want to learnwhat they are.

(17:24):
So there is a very low kind ofentry-level need for previous
knowledge about mushrooms.
But if you're interested in thein the natural world, in
particular mushrooms, thisproject is great because you can
.
A lot of it happens right infront of the public.
Like the observations areposted on iNaturalist, which is

(17:46):
a public platform that everybodycan use, and I'm sure a lot of
the listeners know already aboutiNaturalist.
But all the observations thatare kind of input into this
documenting project are oniNaturalist and you can see the
progress.
What happens when you getsomebody trying to identify that
mushroom?
What happens when you getsomebody trying to identify that
mushroom.
What happens when you get backthe DNA data that we're

(18:08):
generating for this collection?
So it's a very alive projectand you can see it develop in
real time.

Speaker 3 (18:16):
Now, for those that don't know what iNaturalist is,
maybe you can just kind of giveus a background.
Is it a magazine?
Is it a website?
Is it a report?

Speaker 4 (18:27):
It is a website and it's also an app on your phone,
so you can have it on your phone, but usually you can get more
capabilities on the website.
And iNaturalist basically takesthe idea of.
Nowadays, everybody walks witha device on their pocket that
allows you to document thediversity outside, and that is

(18:50):
our cell phones that now havecameras and they're connected to
the Internet most of the time.
So to create an observation oniNaturalist is as simple as
getting your phone camera.
You can also use a traditionalcamera if you want, taking a few
pictures of whatever you wantto document.
In the case of mushrooms, youusually need three or four

(19:13):
pictures to really document thetop of the mushroom, the
underside, kind of all thedetails, and then you take those
pictures and you submit them toiNaturalist and that creates a
unique observation for thatparticular collection of
mushroom, and that's somethingthat anybody can do.
The extra step that really goesinto this documenting mushroom

(19:39):
diversity in North Americaprojects is that you want to
preserve the collection.
You want to dry that mushroomand make it an actual scientific
collection so research canhappen after with that
particular observation.

Speaker 3 (19:54):
Yeah, we've had a number of programs where we talk
about identification formushrooms, for the fruiting
bodies, and, as you mentioned,you take a picture of the stem,
the top, the underside, to seeif it has gills, but also the
time of year that the mushroom'sgrowing, the type of forest or
growth median.
Is it growing on a tree?
What type of tree is it growingon the ground?

Speaker 4 (20:15):
in some of those other things that you, is it
growing in a cluster and allthose sorts of things that to be
able to best identify it fromat least my limited experience,
yeah, all that information isreally important for identifying
mushrooms, and many of theseprojects that we will talk about
today have little kind of fieldslips that will have kind of a

(20:37):
little checklist with many ofthe characters that you
mentioned, like was this growingon wood?
Was it growing on the ground?
Was it just one?
What species of trees werearound?
So basic information that, ifyou record right away when you
are observing these things inthe field, is going to be really
helpful later to help us putall the pieces together about

(21:00):
what this mushroom is.

Speaker 3 (21:02):
Yeah, the Zepfundis annual report, in the vision
statement, talked about fullydocumentation of the fungal
kingdom, which would probably bevery, very difficult.
I had a professor from theUniversity of Toronto that was
talking about various fungusesthat were growing on dust, for

(21:27):
example in households.
So it's probably quite in-depthand very large amounts of
opportunities for various fungalnetworks or kingdoms out there
that try to find.
But the more that we know, thebetter it is for us in
understanding what we're comingfrom or where we're going to or
what the impacts are on us.

Speaker 4 (21:49):
Absolutely One thing that you have to accept very
early on when you become amycologist and this is an
endless endeavor it'sdocumenting the fungal kingdom
and study of fungi is verykingdom.
And study fungi is very, verydifferent from studying animals

(22:10):
or plants.
It's always far more difficult.
You don't have the same accessto the whole organism as
zoologists or botanists have.
If you study animals, even ifthey're tiny, for the most part
you can see the actual organism.
You see them moving, you seethem going about their lives and
you can study them.
With fungi, you don't see theactual organism for the most
part, and only a tiny fractionof fungi actually produce

(22:34):
mushrooms, which is just afruiting structure.
So a comparison that I like tomake for people when they ask
why you know a study of mycologyor mushroom diversity is so far
behind compared with otherthings it's like imagine that
you have to study all the plantsin the world but you never see
the plant.
You only see the fruits andwith that information that the

(22:58):
fruit is giving you, you have tofigure out everything else.
That's what mycologists havehad to do for a really long time
and luckily now we have DNAtechniques that are really
helping us understand mushroomdiversity and document mushroom
diversity.

Speaker 3 (23:15):
Right Now, Alfredo, I always wonder about, for
example, business opportunitieswith the fungal kingdom, and one
of the examples that I alwaysthought would be something that
would be beneficial is that herein Ontario, where we are, we
have these what are called greenbins, which is basically food

(23:38):
waste that goes into a green binand then they're collected on a
weekly basis from all thehouseholds and then they're
taken to a site where they'redumped into large mounds
actually, and they turn thesemounds over.
But if there was some sort ofgrowth that could be put into it

(24:00):
, it would speed up thebreakdown of a lot of that food
waste.
So if they had a fungi thatcould be added to those wastes
as a potential businessopportunity would certainly help
municipalities breaking downtheir waste.
And those are just some of theideas that I wonder about.

Speaker 4 (24:20):
Absolutely.
The way fungal activity can beused for practical purposes for
humans is, again, it's asendless probably as the
diversity itself.
And the thing you have toremember about fungi is that
they are not plants.
They are not doingphotosynthesis.
They are not just sitting thereand getting their food from the

(24:43):
sunlight and a little bit ofnutrients from the soil.
They need something to gettheir food from.
A lot of fungi are decomposers.
If you give them enough organicmatter, they're going to be
acting on that organic matterand decomposing it and breaking
it down and that's how they gettheir food and many industrial
applications or things that wecan think about, how we can use

(25:07):
fungi to help us maybe get ridof all the waste that we are
generating.
These are certainly avenues andresearch that have received a
lot of our attention in recentyears.
Edible fungi A lot of theedible fungi that we can

(25:28):
actually grow in the lab andgrow at a scale needed for food
production are again decomposers, fungi that are going to be
using organic matter to producetheir mushrooms.
So there is definitelyopportunity and there is
definitely interesting avenuesto explore about how mushrooms
get their food and how that isbeneficial for us, because we
can take advantage of the uniqueecologies they have.

Speaker 3 (25:51):
That's for sure.
And you know the food waste isjust one aspect of
municipalities.
I mean there's sewage waste aswell that, if looked at, there
could be.
You know, as we develop thefungal kingdom and understanding
of it to find ways to deal withsewage that have outhouses, as

(26:21):
they say, for their washrooms,that end up having large
concentrations of human wastewhere a fungal component could
be added to break it down a lotquicker.
And I think that the more thatthose things are looked at, the

(26:43):
better it will be for all of usin making sure that we've got
clean environments?

Speaker 4 (26:44):
Yeah, absolutely.
The cleaning aspect of fungalagents has been explored for a
few decades now.
That usually falls under thefield of micro-remediation and
it's not only for small-scalepoints of creating waste but
large-scale contaminationproblems that happen.

(27:06):
A lot of the mushrooms thatactually grow naturally in the
forest are bioaccumulators, sonaturally they will tend to
extract things from the soil andkind of concentrate those in
the mushroom.
That's one of the problemssometimes with edible mushrooms
growing in areas where there isa lot of contamination in the

(27:26):
soil, because the mushroomsthemselves can accumulate some
of the components.
But we can actually takeadvantage of that in some cases
and study well, how can we usefungi to clean up areas that
have a lot of heavy metals ormaybe other type of components
in the soil that we want to getrid of?

(27:47):
How can we use fungi to help usclean up those areas?

Speaker 3 (27:52):
Well, exactly, there's a lot of what are called
brownfield sites, which havebasically contamination in the
sites that if fungi could beutilized to clean up those to
make it.
Because I can think of here inOshawa we've got basically a
number of sites in downtownOshawa that have been sitting
idle and my understanding isthat there's a lot of

(28:13):
contamination in them that if afungi could have been applied
there, the level ofcontamination would be
substantially reduced over thewell 20, 30, 40 years that I
know that these places have beensitting idle.
It gives it certainly a longtime to be able to clean up a
lot of that, which could behappening to some extent on its

(28:35):
own, I believe.

Speaker 4 (28:36):
Yes, that can happen already with organisms that live
there already.
But really micro-remediationreally tries to scale up those
natural processes so we canspeed them up and we can maybe
clean those sites much faster.
But a lot of that is happeningalready just naturally by

(28:57):
organisms that are already thereand they're doing that by
themselves.

Speaker 3 (29:02):
And Alfredo, I know personally.
I have a garden at the front ofmy house.
When we bought the house, therewere plants in there that had
basically consumed a lot of thenutrients in it.
So I've been trying torevitalize that garden in
different ways, rather than justadding fertilizers and manures

(29:23):
and things like that.
But I've done things likebringing in sawdust, for example
, and in hope that I canreinvigorate the soil to to
bring it back to life with uh.
Also, to be honest, I'm usingrice starch in the area to see
if I can to uh reinvigorate thesoil.
So it's a high concentrationwhere the acidity level and the

(29:47):
ability to grow specific plantswill change from basically a
sandy loam to something that'svery beneficial.
And I often wonder aboutopportunities for businesses to
get involved with fungal sort ofmaterials or mycelium that
could be introduced into areaslike that.

(30:07):
That can start to assist, andI'm not sure if you've heard of
anything along those lines ornot.

Speaker 4 (30:13):
There definitely has been research like that and I
know for sure from Europe, butalso I am starting to see more
in North America where a lot ofthe times people, there are
companies that actually sellit's mostly trees but you can
sell trees that are alreadyinoculated, like basically
seedlings, or young trees thatare already inoculated with

(30:36):
fungi on the roots.
Those fungi are going to beassociated, are naturally
associated with the roots of thetree and when you get those
plants into a certain terrainthey already have the advantage
that they have fungi alreadyhelping them grow, helping them
grow faster, but also havingthat fungal activity on the soil

(30:57):
that creates a very dynamicenvironment.
That really is going to behelping kind of speed up a
process.
That probably would havehappened anyway.
But if you kind ofpre-inoculate and have those
plants that you're kind oftransferring or putting in a
certain place, it's going tocertainly help up the health of

(31:20):
the plants but also it's goingto increase the biological
activity in the soil.

Speaker 3 (31:25):
So when you're talking about inoculating trees,
are you talking aboutarbuscular fungal relationships
Are?

Speaker 4 (31:31):
you talking about arbuscular fungal relationships,
both arbuscular orectomycorrhizal, which includes
the group of fungi that actuallyproduce a lot of edible
mushrooms.

(31:53):
So sometimes the purpose is forecological, maybe, restoration,
when you are reintroducing treesin an area that was damaged for
any reason and that wouldinclude fungi that may or may
not have any interest as edibleproducing edible mushrooms.
But sometimes the objective isactually inoculating the tree
with fungi that actually produceedible mushrooms, that you can
inoculate the trees with fungithat produce porcini mushrooms

(32:16):
or that produce certainmilk-capped species that are
edible, and the final objectiveis not only to grow the trees
and eventually use that as aforest product, but also kind of
try to help guarantee thatyou're also going to have edible
mushrooms growing in that area,which is another resource that

(32:37):
you can use.
So sometimes you're looking atmore ecological restoration type
of projects.
Sometimes you're looking at aproduction of edible mushrooms
with inoculated trees andsometimes you're looking at both
, at a production of ediblemushrooms with inoculated trees,
and sometimes you're looking atboth, and again it's looking at

(33:00):
how fungi live, how fungi gettheir food.
In this case you're looking atfungi that are associated with
the tree in a symbioticrelationship that is beneficial
for both, and taking anadvantage of that ecology and
try to use it for our ownadvantage.

Speaker 3 (33:12):
Right, I didn't realize that you could inoculate
trees with edible mushrooms.
Now what type of mushrooms arethey Are they consuming?
So these are live trees thatare growing.
It's a symbiotic relationshipwith the tree that's beneficial
to the tree.

Speaker 4 (33:30):
Yes, so most of the trees well, all of the trees,
basically that you see aroundyou, if you were able to look at
the roots, you will see thatthe roots of the tree and most
vascular plants that are in thetrees also are covered with
fungi.
These are called mycorrhizalfungi Myco for fungus, rhizal
for root, so it's an associatorbetween the root and the fungus.

(33:52):
So, again, fungi cannot producetheir own food like plants.
So what they're doing this wayis the plant is giving the
mushroom, the fungus that isgrowing on the roots, some of
the sugars that the plant isproducing by photosynthesis, so
the fungus is getting its foodIn exchange.
What this mycorrhizal fungi doon the roots is increase the

(34:15):
absorption of water andnutrients from the soil, which
is what the plant wants.
So it's beneficial for both ofthem.
The mycorrhizal fungi are notcausing any harm to the tree.
They're actually helping thetree to grow and the tree, in
exchange, is giving some of itsfood to the fungus.

Speaker 3 (34:33):
Yeah, there's been a number of quite a bit of
research actually on thearbuscular and the other
relationships and how the treescommunicate to each other
through a fungal network as wellas not only providing nutrients
as well in certain times whensome trees have an abundance and

(34:56):
other trees do not.
And I've seen some of theresearch out of the University
of BC with Susan out there andwhere it talks about extensively
about the research there.
It actually seems veryinteresting.
I find it amazing that theycommunicate through the ground
and through these fungalnetworks.

Speaker 4 (35:14):
Yeah, again, it all comes down to the fact that we
don't see the organism.
What is happening under thesoil is the actual organisms
interacting with each other.
What we see most of the timewhen we walk in the forest oh,
we see the mushrooms popping upwhen it's their season.
But the actual biology, theactual organism to organism

(35:37):
interaction, is happening withinthe soil.
And we I mean in recent timesvery difficult because even with
modern methods, most of theevidence that you get is kind of
indirect of what is happeningin the soil You're not looking

(35:59):
at, you know, an animal eating aleaf or an animal being a
predator on another animal.
You don't see thoseinteractions with fungi.
You have to develop anexperimental design that really
allows you to peek into what ishappening in the soil, how the
different individual organismsare actually interacting with

(36:20):
each other.

Speaker 3 (36:21):
Now I recall I'm not sure if you're what we call a
trekkie here, but star trek, thenext generation, where captain
picard is basically his mind iscaptured and he's transported to
another world and basicallyanyways, what's happening is he

(36:42):
believes that he's a citizen ofthis world over extended periods
of time in his mind anyways,which is in the real life world
very short period time in hismind anyways, which is in the
real life world very shortperiod.
But he goes into the details andstarts to do research on the
soil in that particular show inthat episode and he comes to the
conclusion that the world wasactually dying because of the

(37:05):
nutrients or the microorganismsin the soil were being depleted
and killed off in the soil wherewe're being depleted and killed
off.
And I often wonder about thesame sort of thing happening in
our world, where UV radiation iscoming in quite a bit more and
impacting soils and plants andgrowth and things like that,
although nature has its way ofcorrecting itself and helping

(37:28):
out.
But I certainly see, when I seeyards and things like that
where we herbicide, pesticide,do everything possible to kill
everything there and thenfertilize to promote a singular
environment or some of theforests that we have and
monocultures that it's notbeneficial.
And I often wonder about theimpacts of our world on things

(37:52):
like UV radiation or what'shappening with the plastics and
the soil contamination.
And it's the same sort of thingfrom that Star Trek, the Next
Generation TNG, where Picardsees his world dying off, and it
gives me a bit of concern abouthow things are impacted,
whether we're spraying our lawnsfor killing off certain things
that are actually verybeneficial to the soil and

(38:14):
everything else.

Speaker 4 (38:16):
Absolutely.
What happens in the soil is thebasis for everything else, and
it's something that weunderstand less than what is
happening on the surface, butit's probably very important.
So if we do anything to theenvironment, whether it is just
our own lawn or on a largerscale, you know, the is bacteria

(38:36):
.
There is also othermicroorganisms that play a role
in soil ecology.
If we alter what is actuallyhappening in the soil, that is

(39:01):
going to have consequences,maybe long term and for sure on
the surface.
And the soil supports not onlyour forest ecosystems but it
also supports our crops and theway we grow food.
So understanding againunderstanding the biological
processes that happen in thesoil, it is really important,

(39:23):
not only because we want theknowledge as humans, but it has
very direct consequences to whatwe grow for food, how we use
our natural resources.
So understanding that is veryimportant.
And the world of fungal ecology.
I'm not a fungal ecologist, Istudy biodiversity, but I find

(39:46):
it endlessly fascinating.

Speaker 3 (39:49):
I would agree with you completely and I think the
more research that takes place,the more applications will
become evident out there whetherthat's a medical application,
which are more and more researchis taking place.
I think we had Dr Thorne fromWestern who had been dealing
with lion's mane mushrooms fromWestern who had been dealing

(40:13):
with lion's mane mushrooms.
Lion's mane, the research thatI have in a number of papers
I've read talks aboutreconstituting neural pathways
in the brain and spinal column,but Dr Thorne's research
indicated that it was in themycelium where the highest
concentrations, as opposed tothe fruiting body, of beneficial
aspects are.
So the more research we do, themore medical applications

(40:37):
potentially are there, and a lotof the things being utilized
from lion's mane is simplydementia, alzheimer's,
parkinson's and breakthroughs inthose areas I can see coming
through.
And I have to tell you, fredo,that I've met a number of
doctors.
My own doctor is from Sri Lanka, very, very little

(40:59):
understanding of mushrooms atall, but I met a Romanian doctor
who works in the same clinicand she trained in Romania and
has extensive mushroom knowledge.
So it's quite diverse theamount of information that's
there.

Speaker 4 (41:15):
But I think that the medical applications are going
to continue on, so that we'regoing to benefit a lot more from
a lot of these thingsAbsolutely, and I think a lot of
the pharmaceutical compoundsthat we use in medicine and many
of them have been used intraditional medicine for a long
time and eventually they wereresearched for more kind of

(41:36):
industrial Western medicineapplications we have done that
mostly with plants, so fungi arestill a very in-depth resource
in terms of, well, whatsubstances are these organisms
producing?
How can we use them, how can wegrow them, how can we gather
whatever particular chemicalthey're producing?

(41:58):
How is that chemical compoundcan be beneficial for humans?
That is again a field ofresearch that has been expanding
in recent times and I thinkit's going to be very important
moving forward.

Speaker 3 (42:11):
Oh, I think I would agree completely that a lot of
industry or business sectors outthere will be looking at the
fungal networks and thepotentials out there.
I mean, I'm not sure if you'veheard of Metamucil, for example,
where the Metamucil powder, oneof the key components in that
is the weed we call it a weedplantain where they're using
parts of that plantain toprovide regularity for a lot of

(42:35):
individuals.
And in the more research Ilooked into the Metamucil, they
have those gummies where theyuse actually it's a roast
chicory root is what they'reusing in the gummines to keep
people regular, shall we say.
And I find that industry as awhole is doing more and more

(42:56):
research.
So the point bringing this outis those parents and students
listening.
These are some of the areasthat are quickly being jumped on
by business and there's a lotof potential opportunities out
there that people can look into.

Speaker 5 (43:17):
Hi everybody.
I'm Angelo Viola and I'm PeteBowman.
Now you might know us as thehosts of Canada's favorite
fishing show, but now we'rehosting a podcast.
That's right.
Every Thursday, angelo and Iwill be right here in your ears
bringing you a brand new episodeof Outdoor Journal Radio.
Hmm, now, what are we going totalk about for two hours every
week?
Well, you know there's going tobe a lot of fishing.

(43:38):
I knew exactly where those fishwere going to be and how to
catch them, and they were easyto catch.
Yeah, but it's not just afishing show.
We're going to be talking topeople from all facets of the
outdoors, from athletes All theother guys would go golfing Me
and Garth and Turk and all theRussians would go fishing To
scientists.
Now that we're reforesting andletting things breathe.

Speaker 1 (44:00):
It's the perfect transmission environment for
life to be.

Speaker 2 (44:03):
To chefs If any game isn't cooked properly, marinated
, you will taste it.

Speaker 5 (44:10):
And whoever else will pick up the phone Wherever you
are.
Outdoor Journal Radio seeks toanswer the questions and tell
the stories of all those whoenjoy being outside.
Find us on Spotify, applePodcasts or wherever you get
your podcasts.

Speaker 3 (44:29):
And now it's time for another testimonial for Chaga
Health and Wellness.
Okay, we've got Rob fromHamilton here, who's had some
success with the Chaga cream.
Rob, can you tell us about it?

Speaker 6 (44:40):
Yeah, I've used it on blemishes, cuts, just basically
all around healing Anythingkind of blemish.
It speeds it up really quick.
Great, it speeds the speeds itup really quick.
Great, it speeds the healingprocess up really well.
It leaves no marks and doesn'tstain.
It smells okay.

Speaker 3 (45:01):
Okay, thanks, rob, appreciate that.
You're welcome.
We interrupt this program tobring you a special offer from
Chaga Health and Wellness.
If you've listened this far andyou're still wondering about
this strange mushroom that Ikeep talking about and whether

(45:24):
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interest to you.
To thank you for listening tothe show, I'm going to make
trying Chaga that much easier bygiving you a dollar off all our
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(45:46):
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If you're new to Chaga, I'dhighly recommend the regular
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This comes with 15 tea bags perpackage and each bag gives you
around five or six cups of tea.
Hey, thanks for listening Backto the episode Now, alfredo.

(46:09):
One of the things that I noticedthat you know you talked about
in that Fundus annual report wasabout engaging partners and
getting more information outthere, and I think there's a
premise I used to say all thetime was that if you teach a
student, you teach a singular.
If you teach a teacher, youteach the many, so the more

(46:31):
teachers that can be informedabout these fungal kingdoms and
the opportunities out there, themore that it's going to expand
and positions like yours willincrease in demand in many
different ways.
So, alfredo, you sent me someother information.
What is it?
The Mycota, did I say?

Speaker 5 (46:48):
that correctly.
Yeah, mycota.

Speaker 3 (46:49):
Yeah, so it talks about DNA sequencing.
First of all, tell us, just soour listeners know, what is DNA
sequencing in the first place.

Speaker 4 (47:01):
Well, it depends on the context, about what we talk
about.
Dna sequencing these days canmean just sequencing a little
portion of DNA for barcodingliving organisms, sequencing
your whole genome.
Some of us, or some people outthere, have used, you know, have
sequenced their own DNA to lookat their ancestry.

(47:22):
So it can mean different things.
In the modern context, in thecontext of fungal diversity, it
mostly means barcoding.
So you want to sequence a smallportion, a very tiny portion,
of the whole DNA of the mushroomthat you're looking at and with
that tiny portion of DNA you'regoing to compare it, all the

(47:44):
collections that you havesequenced, to each other.
So you want to sequencesomething that is similar enough
within the same species but atthe same time different between
species.
So it allows you, once you havethat little barcode think of
the barcodes of any product thatyou see in the supermarket.
When that barcode is scanned inthe cashier, it tells you

(48:09):
exactly what the product isbecause it's a unique barcode
for that product.
Sequencing DNA for mushroomcollections tries to do the same
thing.
Once you have that barcode,once you have those 600, 700
letters of DNA, it should tellyou what species do you have

(48:34):
letters of DNA.
It should tell you what speciesdo you have.
That's the principle, but as wehave seen, as we have worked on
this research for quite a longtime now, it's actually more
complicated.
Having the data is fantastic,but it's one piece of the puzzle
.
It takes a lot of additionalresearch to put all the pieces
of the puzzle together, toactually get the full picture
about mushroom diversity andwhat species do you have.

Speaker 3 (48:57):
So with DNA sequencing being consistent
through the entire plant,whether it's the fruiting body
or the mycelium.

Speaker 4 (49:04):
Yes, it doesn't matter if you were sequenced
that particular.
Yeah, you will be, it will.
You will get the same resultwhether you're sequencing a
mushroom or sequencing myceliumof the same species.
That will be consistent.
And and again, these type ofprojects like the FANDIS, the
Fungal Diversity Survey that wetalk about most of, the projects

(49:28):
like the Atlantic Canada micromap that we're doing right now.
It tries to sequence as manycollections as possible of
mushrooms, get as many of thosebarcodes of DNA for as many
collections as possible and thenput all that data together and
eventually figure out.
The final answer that we'retrying to answer here is like

(49:53):
how many species of mushroomsthat we have in Canada, in the
States, in Mexico, in NorthAmerica in general for this
project.

Speaker 3 (50:01):
Yeah, I recall when I was Minister of Natural
Resources here in Ontario therewas a company from Texas that
wanted to buy all the rights toDNA from the province of Ontario
for all environments and Irefused to pass that on and I
imagine that from the company'sperspective they're trying to

(50:21):
control a lot of materials thatcould have beneficial aspects
for society as a whole.

Speaker 4 (50:28):
Absolutely for society as a whole.
Absolutely, there is probablythat type of research would
probably look more intosequencing the full genome of
the organism and looking atparticular, maybe genes,
particular portions of thatgenome that do specific things
that may have applications Forthe fungal diversity aspect of

(50:50):
it.
All of the data is actuallypublic as soon as the data, as
those sequences, are generated.
And I should mention all ofthese efforts are mostly run by
non-profit organizations, byvoluntary people who dedicate
their time, their effort andsometimes their own money into

(51:10):
creating this breadth ofknowledge, particularly Steve
Russell, who works at my CoraLabs, who is one of the main
labs who does the actual DNAsequencing.
In just a few years, if you goactually to iNaturalist and look
for well how many mushroomcollections have DNA data, it's

(51:38):
over 70,000 collections ofmushrooms with DNA barcodes in
North America right now and mostof that effort comes again from
community science efforts and Imean I work at an institution
that has a research component,the New Brunswick Museum, and
there are other people workingat universities and this can be
integrated into their researchprograms and this collaboration
is great.

(51:59):
But a lot of the effort isreally from just naturalists,
people who have a particularinterest in mushrooms and who
are willing to dedicate time andeffort into generating that
data.

Speaker 3 (52:14):
Interesting.
So and the big advantage tobasically keeping all these DNA,
because is there mutations in alot of the fungal networks that
are out there that you know 50years from now they may change,
and does the DNA change whenthere's changes in those
networks?

Speaker 4 (52:34):
Probably this type of research won't detect those
changes.
Like evolutionary changes, likeeven mutations, happen over
evolutionary time.
They're really, really slow.
What this project does allow usto do in terms of long-term
research is we can look at if wesequence all the mushrooms that

(52:58):
, let's say, occur right outsideSt John, new Brunswick right
now, and I do that for the nextfive years, somebody 20, 30, 50
years from now can do the samething and they will have my data
, they will have my DNAsequences, they will have the
collections at the New BrunswickMuseum deposited there to

(53:21):
compare and they can do thatagain and say, well, has the
community of fungi has changedin 20 years, in 30 years?
That's something that has beendone quite a lot for, again for
plants and animals, because wehave the baseline data to
compare it to.
For fungi, we are generatingnow that baseline data of what

(53:44):
fungal species do we have inNorth America.
Once we have that kind of basepicture of what we have, we can
come back regularly and see,well, what has changed.
And again, this is we're havingthese DNA sequences open to the
public.
Anybody can go into theindividual iNaturalist
observations and look at thosesequences.

(54:07):
But also having the collections, the actual collections, like
the collections for NewBrunswick, are going to stay at
the New Brunswick Museum as partof the herbarium.
Then having those collectionsand those data is going to allow
us in the future to go back anddo those long-term comparisons.

Speaker 3 (54:26):
So the public at large, Alfredo, can they
contribute and if so, how canthey add to these DNA?

Speaker 4 (54:35):
databanks.
Yes, absolutely Anybody cancontribute to these projects,
wherever you are.
If you are located in AtlanticCanada.
We have kind of an umbrellaproject that brings together New
Brunswick, pei, nova Scotia andNewfoundland and Labrador, so

(54:56):
mushrooms from all of theAtlantic Canada provinces are
going to be kind of studiedtogether, which makes sense.
We're going to share a lot ofspecies and we're going to see
especially for rare species.
We're going to have the chanceto study them across a larger
region.
And if you want to participate,you can go to mycotacom and you

(55:21):
can search for the micro or ifyou just Google micro map
Atlantic Canada, it will takeyou to the landing page of the
project and it will give yousome details about how to keep
your collections, how todocument them, where to send
them for DNA sequencing andanother again another important

(55:43):
part this is at no cost to theend users, which is the end
users, which are the generalpublic.
They have to pay no money tosequence their mushroom
collections.
And basically, if you go to theMicromap Atlantic Canada
network, it will give you thevery specific details.

(56:05):
It's not a complicated process.
Basically, you're going to takepictures in the field of the
mushrooms you want to study.
You're going to try thosemushrooms collections, you're
going to create iNaturalistobservations for each find and
then you're going to mail yourcollections to me or to some of
the other partners in AtlanticCanada and we will eventually

(56:26):
send them for DNA sequencing atmy Coral Lab, for DNA sequencing
at my Coralab.

Speaker 3 (56:29):
Now.
So what areas?
So somebody from Ontario orQuebec would they be able to
send in, or how far east?

Speaker 4 (56:38):
and west do we go?
It expands.
I mean there are also theseevents called continental
microblitzes, which are usuallytwo weeks in the summer, about
two weeks in the fall, whereeverybody can send up to 10
collections.
Quebec has a few sequencingprojects, coordinated through

(57:01):
Myco-Québec, which is kind ofthe group that reunites all
mycologists in Quebec and otherparts of Canada.
They have mycologicalassociations where they're doing
their own sequencing project.
The reason why Atlantic Canadais falling right now under the
umbrella of MycoMap is when Istarted sending New Brunswick

(57:21):
samples to Steve Russell atMycota Labs for sequencing, he
was finding that some of thethings that he was sequencing
they had no matches at all inthe dna databases.
There were things that weresequenced for the first time
here in atlantic canada.
So he decided well, we're gonnaopen up the project so

(57:44):
everybody can document mushroomsin this region and there are a
few regions now that are openfor this kind of unlimited
sequencing.
But if you just contact my CotaLabs and you have a particular
project, I'm sure they canfigure out how to kind of bring

(58:05):
you into the umbrella of theproject.
But there are different ways.
I would say if you'reinterested in general in fungal
diversity, look around your area.
See what mycological groups,mycological societies or even
general naturalist societies ornature clubs are around your

(58:25):
area.
They will probably can help yougetting in touch with people
who are more invested into thesequencing aspect.

Speaker 3 (58:34):
So this would be something potentially I know
because I did some lectures, forexample at schools.
Say oh, the one I did inMillbrook where the students
could potentially go out andcollect a number of samples and
then do this process and submitthem.

Speaker 4 (58:51):
Absolutely, and this is a type of project that lends
very well, with somecoordination, to projects that
can be done with students.
I've done similar projects, notfor mushrooms specifically, but
when I was teaching back inMassachusetts at Worcester State
University, we did useiNaturalist in some of our

(59:11):
ecology labs to basically howcan we use this to document
diversity just in your localpark, in your local nature
protected area that you may havenear you?
And really all the componentsare there, the resources are
there.
The resources are there.
It's just try to coordinate,come up with a plan so you can

(59:36):
definitely use this type ofproject in a school setting for
sure.

Speaker 3 (59:40):
So, and the specific steps necessary to do
submissions are all there and ittells people because you
mentioned you need to dry them,how to dry them to a standard.
So that's so.

Speaker 4 (59:51):
There's not problems when they're being shipped yeah,
basically you have to make surethey're very crisp.
They're, you know, kind ofcracker crisp.
They're completely, have losttheir their moisture so they
don't and they tend to rehydrate.
But if they're completely drythen they be fine.

(01:00:11):
We can take it from there whenyou send us the collections.
And the best way to do it, ifyou're really going to be
invested in this type of project, is to get just a food
dehydrator.
They're not expensive, butthink of it as one more
investment for your naturalistactivities.

(01:00:32):
But definitely if you're goingto be studying mushroom with
certain regularity, I would sayget a food dehydrator.
That is going to be the fasterway.
Basically, mushrooms have to bedry, with kind of hot air, but
not extremely hot air flowingover them, so that's the best
way to dry them quickly.

Speaker 3 (01:00:53):
Yeah, I see different articles.
One was out of what was it?
Vitality Magazine and talksabout extracting the benefits
from Chega but not to take itover 140 degrees Fahrenheit when
doing an extraction with a warmwater extraction but it goes

(01:01:13):
into sake because it couldpotentially kill off any of the
benefits.
But there's no research toverify or deny it, because I see
a lot of articles that doextraction of components,
particularly in South Korea andthe same ones where they
actually do extractions at aboiling point.
So that's quite a bit hotter,but is it the same thing here

(01:01:35):
that not too hot because it maykill off some of the benefits or
some of the DNA informationthat's being looked for?

Speaker 4 (01:01:43):
That's something that has been discussed by the
mycological community for a longtime.
I think we have come to decidethat what is most important is
to dry the mushrooms quickly.
The temperature is lessimportant.
I usually when I bring themushrooms back to the museum
from the field and put them inthe dryers, that dryer is

(01:02:07):
usually about 40 degrees Celsiusand usually that dries between
24, 48 hours depending on thesize of the mushroom.
If you have really bigmushrooms it's better to cut
them in half so they dry quicker.
They're very fleshy mushroomsbut I would say 40 degrees

(01:02:29):
Celsius for 24, 48 hours.
But I think we already haveseen that if you dry them
Basically, the key point is todry them quickly, as quickly as
possible.
That is what.
If you don't dry them rightaway, that's where you might see
some degradation of the DNAthat later may not allow you to

(01:02:53):
sequence the mushroom properly.
So dry them quickly.
Get a food dehydrator if youcan.
Those are the best tips fordrying the mushrooms.

Speaker 3 (01:03:02):
Now is there a problem with when you put them
in the dehydrator?
Because I know I had one friendwho was supplying a researcher
with dehydrated mushrooms thathe was finding in the wild, but
his dehydrator filled up withspores, according to him as a
result of dehydrating themushroom, and does that

(01:03:22):
complicate problems for anythingelse?

Speaker 4 (01:03:25):
Not really.
The dehydrator is going to befine.
What I would say?
If you try to keep things tidyand neat, remember a dehydrator
is basically blowing hot airinto the mushrooms.
So maybe put the mushroomsinside a paper bag so they don't
blow all over the place.
You want to keep eachcollection separate from each
other, so if you just put themin a dehydrator they're just

(01:03:47):
going to blow all over the place.
I have little boxes cardboardboxes that I use to separate my
samples from each other, but youcan put paper bags.
The mushrooms can be insidepaper bags with maybe the
iNaturalist number written onthe outside or something that
identifies the mushroom.
You will probably have labelsalready printed at this point,

(01:04:08):
but little paperbacks can beused to kind of separate the
samples and keep everythinginside the dehydrator tidy.

Speaker 3 (01:04:16):
Very interesting.
So, Alfredo, are you familiarwith chaga?

Speaker 4 (01:04:20):
I'm familiar with chaga.
I know a lot of people throughthe Mycological Society here in
New Brunswick, MycoMV, that dolook for chaga.

Speaker 3 (01:04:29):
So I have a question then for you Is the chaga found
on yellow birch the same asfound on ironwood, the same
that's found on white birch, thesame that's found on different
poplar strains as well?

Speaker 4 (01:04:43):
As far as I know right now, yes.
When we have a sequence, 200 or300 samples of chaga across
North America, maybe I will havea different answer, but we
don't have them yet, as far as Iknow.
Yes, it's the same species.
As far as we can tell right now, yes, but again, that's exactly

(01:05:05):
the type of question that we'retrying to answer Like is this
mushroom that I see all over theplace, the same species
everywhere?
Right?
That's exactly what we'retrying to do For chaga as of
right now?
Yes, but ask me again in fiveyears.

Speaker 3 (01:05:19):
All right, I'll tell you what I'll commit to, because
we do a lot of harvesting, Iwill commit to send in different
samples, and is there aspecific moisture content that
you need to get it down to?
Because that's how I check thechagas, by checking the moisture
content.

Speaker 4 (01:05:37):
Basically with any mushrooms.
What you're looking for issomething that will not grow
mold because it's too wet or, inthe case of fleshy mushrooms,
that it will not rehydrate byitself really quickly.
So again, drying anything for24, 48 hours at 40 degrees

(01:05:58):
Celsius should be fine for mostthings at 40 degrees Celsius
should be fine for most things.

Speaker 3 (01:06:01):
Yeah, I'll send in a different from white birch,
yellow birch, hop horn bean,ironwood and some other strains
that we find as well, and thenthe expertise can better decide
what may be beneficial there ornot.

Speaker 4 (01:06:17):
Yeah, absolutely Just knowing what it is Like in
biology, maybe I think it's.
The first question is whatorganism are you dealing with?
And for mushrooms, that isstill a question that has no
answer for many of them, right?
Because we still have to figureout exactly how many species do
we have, how do we tell themapart?

(01:06:38):
And that's what we're trying todo.

Speaker 3 (01:06:41):
So in some of the research are you finding that
the different growth mediansthat mushrooms are found in may
have different benefits orcomponents, or DNA sequencing?

Speaker 4 (01:06:51):
Like I don't particularly do like grow things
myself in the lab but, likemost of the time I just work
with the mushrooms, so I don'tlook necessarily anything beyond
what the mushroom is and whatthe DNA sequence for that
particular collection is.

(01:07:12):
A lot of the people who do growmushrooms in a lab setting,
definitely they do try to growthem, especially if they're
looking at an expression of howmuch of this particular compound
the mushroom is producing.
Definitely, trying differentgrowth mediums is gonna, is

(01:07:32):
gonna be part of the experiment,because you, a certain organism
, may produce a certainsubstance, but only under
certain conditions, so thatdefinitely if you're looking at
expression of chemical compounds, you're going to be trying to
grow them in different ways andsee how it changes.

Speaker 3 (01:07:50):
Yeah, because, uh, as I've mentioned a couple times
about dr thorn and lion's maneand and his research, telling me
that in the mycelium had thehighest medicinal applications.
But I asked him about thefruiting body and he said they
hadn't done any research on that, but also the growth medians.

(01:08:11):
Is there different levels ofmedicinal applications found in
different growth medians?
And, as you just said, they tryto find specific components to
be able to produce certainaspects within their own fungal
kingdom, to produce certainthings.

Speaker 4 (01:08:39):
So there's a lot more research needs to be done.
I think, yeah, no, absolutely,we have to look, you have to be
when it comes to expression of,you know, certain properties you
definitely want to have as awider range of experimental
settings as possible.

Speaker 3 (01:08:54):
Yeah, there's so many different things.
Now, alfredo, tell us about now.
I've got a business of dyslexia, so it's the nova uh
celestorotium.

Speaker 4 (01:09:05):
Oh, that's the nova sclerotium.
Yes, that's the newsletter forthe nova scotia mycological
society.
Okay, yeah, and I I did a kindof a small article I think it
was 2019, which actually talksabout most of the things that we
talk about today here, abouthow much effort we still have to

(01:09:28):
put into documenting fungaldiversity.
And, yeah, newsletters formycological societies and Nature
Club are treasure troves ofinformation.
If you're interested, we alsohave one for the new brunswick
mycological society.
Myco mb is called fungus cryptaand it's also available to the

(01:09:51):
to the public.
You just go to myco mborgthat's our mycological
association in new brunswickwebsite and you can read and
it's really a great place forpeople who are part of the
society to really share whatthey're finding, and it can be a
recipe of the mushrooms they'recooking.

(01:10:11):
It can be some research thatI'm doing at the museum, it can
be anything.
So, yeah, the Nova Sclerotiumnewsletter for Nova Scotia also
publishes small articles fromtheir members.

Speaker 3 (01:10:25):
Oh, very good.
Well, alfredo, I very muchappreciate all the information.
I found it very interesting andenlightening in a lot of ways
and, from what I'm hearing,there's a lot of opportunities
for listeners, whether it'sthrough their school, or to get
involved in participating indeveloping the DNA sequencing or
the database out there.

(01:10:46):
By participating, which isalways great for our listeners,
and you mentioned a number ofdifferent areas that people can
get more research, whether it'sthe iNaturalist or some of the
other areas, which was the firstthing that we talked about was
the Fundus report, as well assome of the other things.

(01:11:08):
So, alfredo, how do people getin touch with you or where can
they find out more informationregarding all the great things
that we've been talking about?

Speaker 4 (01:11:17):
Well, you can find me .
I have my own webpage,alfredohustowebleycom, but if
you just Google Alfredo JustoMycology, it's going to be me.
There are not that many, soAlfredo Justo Mycology will take
you to my research page.
You can find me through the NewBrunswick Museum website and

(01:11:38):
you can contact me through theNew Brunswick Museum.
No problem at all.
I also do a lot of activitieswith the MycoMB Society, the New
Brunswick Mycological Society,especially during mushroom
season.
I try to do a nature walk withthem once a month during
mushroom season.
So yeah, I'm very findable onthe internet.

(01:12:02):
You just search for AlfredoJusto Mycology and also check
out other websites.
If you're interested in any ofthese projects that we talk
about today, Just go to FungalDiversity Survey or go to the
North American MycologicalSociety and they will have links

(01:12:22):
and how to contact people, howto get more in touch with many
of the fungal diversity projectsthat are happening across North
America asking me to take themon nature walks.

Speaker 3 (01:12:44):
Now, I've done a couple with schools and I talk
about various things whetherit's a red clover or maple syrup
or how apple trees pollinateand all those different things
but nature walks fungal naturewalks are something that a lot
of people really want to findout about.
So you mentioned about a naturewalk, and this is the first I'm
hearing about it.
Tell us about yours, do you?

Speaker 4 (01:13:07):
know when they are and is there a cost involved and
where are they located?
Okay, so for the ones that I doin New Brunswick with my CoMB,
they're free for the members ofthe society.
So you just have to become amember and then you have access
to all the walks.
So I'm located mostly in saintjohn, so I do in the saint john
region, but we have other peoplein new brunswick doing walks

(01:13:29):
around fredericton, aroundmoncton, and we're trying to
expand a little bit to thenorthern part of the province.
So the best way to know whenthese are happening, the society
has a Facebook page and we makepublic the dates of these walks
.
Again, for myself, I usually tryto do one in July, august,

(01:13:52):
september, october.
So at least four walks everyseason, every season.
Then we also have an annualforay for the society.
That again gets advertisedthrough the Facebook page and
through the page of the societyitself.
So, just yeah, just go tomicroNBorg or find the

(01:14:14):
Mycological Society of NewBrunswick through Facebook and
you will see of these activitiespopping up, starting June, july
and running through themycological season, and every
walk is just about a one to twohour walk in some interesting
natural area of New Brunswickand we basically talk about the

(01:14:37):
mushrooms.
We find that day and somepeople come with an interest,
just basically edible versustoxic, and we tell them about
that.

Speaker 3 (01:14:46):
Give us, can you, alfredo, can you just spell out
that Facebook page?
It's.
What is it?
Mycomborg?
It's.

Speaker 4 (01:14:54):
M-Y-C-O-N-B, as in New Brunswick dot org.
Okay, yeah, mycomborg.
Okay, very good.

Speaker 3 (01:15:02):
WelloinBeeorg.
Okay, Very good.
Well, thank you very much.
I really appreciate that.
I think that people will findit very interesting, because I
know that there's a significantnumber of listeners who are
constantly looking for fungalwalks to be able to get out and
find a mushroom and someexperience and to gain more

(01:15:25):
knowledge.
You know, for those in the EastCoast certainly, but the more
connections that people have forthings in the Toronto or the
Southern Ontario would bebeneficial as well.
But I'm sure that those cankind of open up.

Speaker 4 (01:15:40):
Yeah, no, and there is a Toronto Mycological Society
and I'm sure they also havetheir own activities.
And in Quebec there is a lot ofmycological groups, and if you
are located elsewhere, look foryour closest mycological society
.
I'm sure there is one near you.

Speaker 3 (01:15:58):
Well, thank you very much, Dr Alfredo Justo, for
taking the time to be on ourpodcast.
We very much appreciate it, andit's just some more interesting
things that we're learning outthere under the canopy.
Thanks again, thank you forhaving me.

Speaker 5 (01:16:33):
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(01:16:56):
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