GROWING GOURMET - Anto2ni.it

414 GROWTH PARAMETERS
spawn throughout the depth of the substrate. Heavily water the site, provide shade and then institute
the strategy of benign neglect—ignore it until early spring.
When Morel spawn is planted late in the year, between the months of October and December, the
mushroom patch remains localized to the inoculation site. In contrast, Morel spawn that is planted in
the spring often gives rise to fruitings remote from the inoculation site. A professor from the Portland
State University planted her spawn in the early summer. The next spring she found a convoy of Morels
fruiting from the site of inoculation extending several hundred feet along a walk-way. This also illustrates
that, by locating your Morel patch in an area generally conducive to Morel growth, a
substantially larger patch than one just lOft. x lOft. in size can be created. From my experience, the
best sites, always shaded, are: around freshly laid wood chips of elm, oak, poplar, cottonwood andlor
Douglas fir, in apple orchards, along gravel driveways, in washes from overflowing streams, and of
course in soils where a fire has swept through. The greater the access to these types of favorable habitats
that you give the Morel mycelium, the larger your potential Morel patch. The larger the mycelial
mat, the more opportunities for widespread, underground scierotia formation. Once the spawn is in
place, you relinquish control over to natural forces. In effect, you allow Nature to do what it does best.
I have always envisioned, being the mad scientist at heart, of aerially bombarding prospective
habitats with Morel scierotia. Every time I see a television report of airplanes using a fire-retardent to
quench a forest fire, I imagine their returning a week or two later and bombing the same sites with a
scierotial slurry of Morel spawn. I happily volunteer to be the spawn maker and thebombardier!
Outdoor Morel beds often support other mushrooms, some of which I view as "indicator" species.
Their presence is a sure sign that the habitat is suitable for Morels. The most common and welcome
indicator species are the brown cup fungi, species belonging to the Genus Rhizina (R. undulata),
Discina (D. perlata) & the Genus Peziza, P. phyllogena (= Peziza badio-confusa).
Since I find Morels fruiting abundantly in amongst these cup fungi, I do not view them as true competitors.
Furthermore, the False Morel, Gyromitra esculenta and the Early Morel,Verpa bohemica,
precede Morels by two or more weeks. (See Chart, Figure 369).
In the Pacific Northwest, Morels are found directly at the base of cottonwood trees. A new hybrid
strain of cottonwoods, a cross between eastern and western varieties, is being planted en masse for
pulp production. The mating of these two varieties has yielded a "super strain" of cottonwoods,
which grow up to an inch per day. These cottonwoods, with their accelerated life cycles, seem like
ideal candidates for the companion cultivation of Morels outdoors.
A similar approach might work with apple trees. By locating an morel bed directly underneath
apple trees, the cultivator could create a perennial Morel patch. Orchards, both small and large scale,
could provide a bumper crop each spring. Once established, the Black Morel is well known to frequent the
same apple orchard for decades. Most other habitats provide only a temporary home for Morels.
Since cottonwoods enjoy especially wet conditions, often unsuitable for pines, their soils are characterized
as having a naturally higher moisture content. This environment is ideal for the natural
cultivation of a number of many mushrooms outdoors, including those on logs and on chip/sawdust
mounds. Mature cottonwoods can be harvested and inoculated with a wide variety of gourmet and
medicinal mushrooms. Logs can be impregnated with Reishi (Ganoderma lucidum), Maitake
(Grifolafrondosa), Shiitake (Lentinula edodes), or Lion's Mane (Hericiuin erinaceus) mycelium.
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