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 veggie
Registered: 07/25/04
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 Expert on mushrooms shares wisdom globally
#6475626 - 01/19/07 05:06 AM (5 years, 4 months ago) |
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Expert on mushrooms shares wisdom globally
January 19, 2007 - contracostatimes.com
DID YOU KNOW that most varieties of mushrooms are not grown in the dark? They aren't grown on horse manure, either.
In fact, the only 'shrooms that are grown that way are the common commercial mushrooms, called champignons, that you buy in the supermarket.
All the rest -- including oyster mushrooms, Shitaki and other gourmet fungi -- actually need light to grow. And instead of dung, they're raised in a vegetable compost mixture, called substrata, that's been pasteurized to make it germ-free.
So says Ralph Kurtzman of Berkeley, and he ought to know: He's one of the world's leading experts on mushroom cultivation. His book, "Oyster Mushroom Cultivation," is the standard work in the field.
On Tuesday he'll travel to Ukraine, where he'll spend the next three weeks teaching the locals the fine points of mushroom farming. Then he'll fly to Cairo to teach the tricks of the trade to 450 Egyptian women who are being sponsored by CARE.
"CARE is better known for its relief work, but most of its efforts nowadays goes toward improving women's economic situation," he says.
This will be his second visit to Egypt. In the fall, he gave lectures and taught the women how to create an ideal growing medium by simultaneously pasteurizing and moistening straw or other vegetable farm waste.
This time, the women will put the theories into practice and create their own mushroom farms, under his guidance.
Kurtzman, who just turned 73, has done the same thing in 16 cities on six continents and has been to Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, India, Pakistan, Thailand, Colombia, Taiwan and Japan as a volunteer for the U.S. Agency for International Development.
"We're a sort of senior Peace Corps," he says. "Rather than fresh college graduates, we are seasoned 'experts' who go for short stays to consult and teach with the hope of improving conditions in Third World countries."
He didn't intend to become a mushroom expert. Thirty years ago, he was working as a biochemist for the U.S. Department of Agriculture when he was handed a new assignment -- come up with an economical and ecological way of disposing of vegetable farm waste.
"I researched thoroughly, and the only feasible use I could find was using it to grow mushrooms."
But that wasn't the answer his superiors wanted to hear.
"They wanted me to say we could use straw as animal feed," he says. "But unless an animal has a rally tough stomach, such as a water buffalo, it won't work. If you feed it to cows, they'll become emaciated."
His reward? His bosses fired him. (The courts later made them give him his job back.)
"I find it ironic that I'm now being welcomed by USAID, which is another agency of the same government that once tried to fire me," he says.
Over the past three decades, he's become an expert in mushroom cultivation, a field with a surprisingly short history.
"People have been cultivating mushrooms for only about two or three hundred years," he says. "Before that, they ate whatever they found in the field."
Most people agree that mushroom farming started in France. But how did the no-light, manure-grown champignons come to dominate the market?
"Back then, there were a lot of horses relative to people, and they had to figure out a way to get rid of all that horse manure. So they threw it into the pits and caves of Paris. Then they discovered mushrooms growing in the stuff. It was a win-win solution."
Kurtzman doesn't visit luxury tourist spots. He lives as the people live.
Some places where he stays don't even have an outhouse, much less indoor plumbing. And he loves it.
"I'd much prefer to travel in this manner. I'm getting close to people and finding out how they live. It's a lot more interesting than going to see a bunch of monuments."
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 elaspeinreason
psychonaut
Registered: 07/31/05
Posts: 1,028
Loc: fairfax virginia
Last seen: 2 years, 10 days
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Re: Expert on mushrooms shares wisdom globally [Re: veggie]
#6475968 - 01/19/07 09:02 AM (5 years, 4 months ago) |
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brilliant man , and wonderful work hes doing.
unbelieveably persistant in his efforts to help others
"Kurtzman doesn't visit luxury tourist spots. He lives as the people live.
Some places where he stays don't even have an outhouse, much less indoor plumbing. And he loves it.
" 
i could only hope to attain that amount of mushroom knowledge
- great job Mr Kurtsman.
--------------------
Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one
Diploid said:
What's with proclaiming freedom by abridging freedom? That makes no sense.
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