The cool, comforting rains of Autumn have arrived at our coastal home, and with them, the start of mushroom season. So many fungal friends are popping up in our yard- edible ones like Oysters and Honey Mushrooms, medicinals like Turkey Tail, and a few I’ve never seen before. I need to get out there with my field guide and meet them properly!
The cycles of plants in Nature always amaze me for their beauty and sheer life force power, and for their timeliness. So often, I have noticed that a plant (or fungus, in this case!) pops up just when seasonal issues or personal imbalances start up. I hope this happens for you, too- that your inner world is supported by the beings of Nature that live all around you, wherever you are.
As we move into the season of immune challenges, mushrooms offer some of the best support to our defenses. Evolutionarily, they are closer to us animals than to plants, and they can be afflicted by many of the same pathogens that we are subject to. This means that their defenses match ours very well, making them excellent for quick response to an illness, as well as being balanced and safe tonics for long term use.
Many mushrooms fit in the place between food and medicine, which also indicates that they are safe and well-tolerated enough to have been eaten in significant amounts for thousands of years in the cultures they have lived near. We work with a few fungal beings in this special category:
Shiitake is probably the best known medicinal mushroom we work with, since it is also a popular edible mushroom. Shiitake’s edibility points to its uses as a balanced tonic and nutritive herb, easy and safe to use on a regular basis.
On the more medicinal side, Shiitake is the only natural substance ever proven to reverse HIV infection, and has also shown promise in treating herpes, hepatitis, and the common colds and flus. It’s also antioxidant and detoxifying to many body systems, and our Shiitake Essence is a tasty expression of all this mushroom’s qualities.
Another edible and medicinal mushroom Spagyric is our Maitake Essence, from a mushroom which grows in temperate forests around the world. In Japan and China, Maitake has been used to boost the immune system and regulate metabolism. Modern studies indicate that this mushroom supports healthy blood sugar balance, maintains healthy blood pressure and cholesterol levels, and supports weight loss. Maitake has also shown anti-cancer properties, especially against breast cancer.
Agaricus blazei is a mushroom on the more medicinal side of the food-medicine continuum, but if you do find fresh ones, they are delicious. They’re large and meaty like a portobello, but with an interesting toasted almond taste. That nutty note, along with the usual deep forest funk that most mushrooms have, is there in our Agaricus blazei Spiritualized Essence.
Agaricus b. has the widest array of immune-boosting constituents of any mushroom, and outperformed all other tested mushrooms in treating a variety of cancers. Our Spiritualized Essence of it is an uplifting energy tonic, boosting vitality and strengthening the Wei Qi.
Another beautiful mushroom that grows in our area is Lion’s Mane, which is also easy to grow from kits. This mushrooms starts as a tight, cauliflower-like formation, and then trails out into long icicle-like shapes when it’s ready to harvest. Lion’s Mane has a delicious lobster or shrimp-like taste and texture, great for pasta and stir fry.
Medicinally, Lion’s Mane is a superior tonic to the nerves and brain tissue, acting as a regenerative to their structure and functions. Used to both support healthy cognitive function, and to heal the damage from injury and illness, Lion’s Mane has become more famous lately because of its use in the “Stamets Stack” nootropic combination of psilocybin, Lion’s Mane and Niacin.
Our Lion’s Mane Spiritualized Essence is a really interesting brain tonic, having a very intelligent and balanced action. It can be enlivening and stimulating to the mind, but can also act to calm nerves and quiet thought, depending on the direction needed.
Moving out of common culinary mushrooms and into the more medicinal, Cordyceps is a strange and interesting fungal being- it is a fungus that takes over dormant insects, growing through their bodies and controlling their behaviour in order to position its fruiting so that its spores are spread as far as possible and the cycle can continue. Besides its zombie-movie lifestyle, Cordyceps is famous as a respiratory and energy tonic, and both our Essence and Spiritualized Essence carry this intelligence.
Cordyceps has been shown to improve oxygen uptake by the lungs, and also make the transport of oxygen through the body more efficient. This makes it an excellent ally for both short- and long-term respiratory imbalances, from flu and bronchitis to asthma and COPD. It is also a powerful immune booster and adaptogen, helping the overall function of the whole body as it heals the lungs.
Our Cordyceps Essence is made from rice-grown fungus, which is more economical and also vegan, and it is a relaxing, opening tonic to the breath and body. It brings calm to the overstimulated and restricted breathing that can happen with anxiety and asthma attacks, and it uplifts the mood at the same time.
Our Cordyceps Spiritualized Essence is made from the more traditional caterpillar and fungus combination, which we find has a stronger energy of vitality, immune defense, and transformation of illness and imbalance.
Reishi is a legendary mushroom from Traditional Chinese Medicine, where it is revered as a physical and spiritual tonic. Said to be the “mushroom of immortality” that protects the gods and immortals from illness, it is a superior tonic for us mortals, too.
We offer two levels of Reishi Spagyric: an Essence of the “shelf” form, and the more rare “antler” form, as a Spiritualized Essence. A new vintage of the Antler form is being processed in the lab right now, but we just finished a new vintage of the Essence, made from the “shelf” form.
Our Reishi Essence is an excellent immune ally, as you’d expect, and also a balancing energy tonic, having a nice combination of vitalizing and centering qualities. This intelligent adaptogenic quality can also be used for blood pressure imbalances, metabolic and digestive issues, as well as the healthy function of most of the body’s systems and organs.
Less well-known than these others, Chaga is a crusty black fungus that forms on birch trees, widely consumed in Northern Europe and Russia, and associated with lower instances of cancer in societies where it is used. It is an ancient ally to human health, known since at least the time of the frozen Neolithic man known as the “ice man”, who carried it in his kit.
Chaga has also shown strong cancer preventative and treatment effects, along with anti-infective properties. Chaga is especially tonic to the liver, and we find our Chaga Spiritualized Essence to be an energy and mood lifter, as well.
Finally, coming back to our corner of the world, we are starting to see one of the most common mushrooms of our area pop up, taking advantage of what rain we have gotten- Turkey Tail, colourfully colonizing any cut piece of wood it finds, as I wrote in this article.
Its elegant fans with stripes of tan, beige, and brown really do look like the tail of a proud Tom turkey, fanning out from the wood they eat and digest into rich forest soil.
As they break down the lignins in the wood, they transform them into polysaccharides, a sugar-based family of molecules that carry the healing properties of most tonic herbs and fungi. These constituents are balanced in their action, acting as adaptogens to nudge the body back to center and a healthy state, and our Turkey Tail Spiritualized Essence has been a good ally for many in need of this healing.
As with most medicinal mushrooms, Turkey Tail has also been used to treat cancer, both to fight it directly and to ameliorate the side effects of conventional treatments. For this and other long-term healing work, it combines well with Astragalus root.
