Why Mushrooms for health?

Let’s start by giving you a few facts about mushrooms that you may or may not know. A mushroom is a type of Fungus, ‘oh no, I hear you say fungus can’t be good for you’, well firstly think of all those delicious and nutrient rich mushrooms that end up on our dinner plates, they are good for you, think of penicillin, the first antibiotic, yep it was discovered in fungus, whilst that sinks in we can say that not all fungus or mushrooms are good for you but it does seem that they all serve a purpose on our planet.

For a mushroom to grow a spore (mushroom seed) must find a fertile source, be it soil or wood, it will then germinate into mycelium, this can often look like spider web like threads, when the mycelium joins with another mycelium it can then reproduce and produce fruiting bodies (mushrooms)

Mycelium is present in over 30% of the earths land mass and now it is understood that it is vital for many plants, trees and therefore vital for our entire ecosystems to survive. Without delving too deep, the mycelium allows plants to ‘communicate’ with each other through its network, the most fascinating example of this, that blew my mind was that, a squirrel could take an acorn from an oak tree, bury it half a mile away, if the acorn sprouts the mother oak tree could send that acorn nutrition through the mycelium network, it could basically nurture its offspring with the help of the fungus.

Another amazing fact is that mycelium in soil becomes a carbon bank, so just imagine a mycelium network beneath your lawn, not only would lead to a healthier lawn but also help the planet by storing carbon. Now imagine if you will, that every lawn and un-toiled piece of land on our planet had a mycelium network beneath it that could double the amount of carbon the soil stores, what would happen with the carbon issue our planet currently faces?

Believe it or not mushrooms can help with so many of the problems faced in our world, mycelium could replace the timber that use in construction or most other industries, a mycelium network can be grown in any shape to create any item of furniture or even building bricks and can take as little as seven days to form, no more waiting 10 years for a tree to grow and then chopping down a forest. Mycelium can create fabrics even faux leather. Research has shown the mycelium can grow on an oil slick and break the crude oil down to its natural elements and thus cleaning up such manmade disasters, oh and if mushrooms grew on top of that mycelium they’d be edible because of the way the mycelium breaks down the toxic substrate, unbelievable I know.