The Arboretum sold out for everyone who failed to plan. It staggers entrance times, so while it was possible to get a ticket, one would miss most of the fair. The event was packed, the largest in years. Sun broke through the heavily chemtrail sprayed skies. Now the crisscross lines start with perfect X's, which would not happen in nature nor in ordinary flight paths overcrowded LA County. In any case, what was clear was soon covered over in an artificial and no doubt toxin mist. But the sun managed to break through at times. The Fair opened at 9:00 am, the Mushroom Hunt began at 10 with Olga from Smugtown, and it was followed by a fabulous Brando with a culinary demonstration that fed everyone -- hundreds of mushroom fans -- crowding the seating area. It was standing room only after a while, as the samples table was full of gawkers and vendors were hard at work keeping up with demand: medicinal tinctures, popular red-and-white mushroom hats (French berets), grow bags, dried delicacies, books, guide, posters, clothing, jewelry, and services. This is the only event that ever provided samples such as a choice of savory soup, sauteed morrells, black trumpets, or all three. There was a vegan food booth in the back with a line out the door. Then came the first speaker, Mycologist Else, talking about spores, which exists in the billions and trillions. "Spores are not seeds," she emphasized. Each needs a mate since one can create a small mat of tubule structures but must then meet with a partner spore to continue onto the mycelia phase. Mycelia is what keeps forest together, the Woodwide Web, breaking down matter and communicating between individual plants. (See Paul Stamets' Mycelium Running). A "mushroom" is the fruiting body of underground mycelia, what we see popping up from the ground or growing on trees. To study mushrooms and fungi soon becomes the study of trees and ecosystems. Our natural world would not be what it is without fungi.
Where, oh where, do the wild things grow? We're determined to find out!
On Sunday, February 15, 2026, from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm, we're trekking over to Arcadia in the San Gabriel Valley, next to Pasadena, to the Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanic Garden.
2:30-3:00 pm - Art and photo contest winners announced
3:00-4:00 pm - Feces, corpses, and the business of fungal decay talk by Sam Shoemaker
4:00 pm - Fair closes
TICKETS: Admission to the Wild Mushroom Fair is FREE with admission to The Arboretum. Tickets are available online. Act now because time slots may sell out as they have before. Check ticket availability here: Hours and Admission (The Arboretum).
Admission to The Arboretum: $18 for adults, $14 for seniors (62 and over), $14 for students with school ID, $8 for children (ages 3-12), and children 2 and under $0 (free). Arboretum members: free. Parking is free. More info about LAMS events is available at lamushrooms.org/events.
This is what happens to trees when they take in "excess" CO2. That's a silly statement to fan the fires of global warming alarmism. There is no "excess." However much or little there is in the atmosphere, there's a failsafe system in place to restore us to balance. Like mushrooms (fungi), mammals breathe out carbon that trees breathe in. Then they breathe out oxygen.
It's a wonderful system, self-sustaining, self-correcting, self-balancing. More carbon is GOOD for trees and chlorophyll plants, most of which are in the ocean in the form of plankton and seaweeds.
Oak trees, for instance, accumulate more wood when there is more carbon dioxide (CO₂) in the atmosphere, a recent study shows.
Oak tree branches under sun in summer in Aegean Turkey (Emreturanphoto/Moment/Getty)
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Oak trees accumulate more wood when there is more carbon dioxide (CO₂) in the atmosphere. That’s the key finding from our new study, carried out in a long-established forest in Staffordshire, England, that we have turned into a huge field experiment by injecting with extra CO₂.
After we increased CO₂ levels to what will be the planetary level in the 2050s, trees took more of it from the atmosphere and their wood production increased by 10 percent.
More CO2, please. We love it.
In some ways, this result is reassuring. We know that more CO₂ in the atmosphere can often help plants grow bigger and faster since photosynthesis captures the carbon [but we're trying to find a way to negatively spin that so people continue to alarmism] from which plants are largely made.
However, until now, the only comparable study on an older, mature forest (an Australian eucalyptus forest) found no link between extra CO₂ and tree growth.
Our work shows the link really does exist — at least in some common broadleaf forests.
However, woodier trees do not offer a silver bullet to solve climate change.
While carbon is certainly better off in trees than in the atmosphere, where it causes global warming, it’s not a long-term solution. [Of course not, because we need a manmade solution that can be monetized to profit private industry; we can't afford to leave this in the hands of Mother Nature.]
Over decades or centuries, wood rots away, and carbon dioxide is released back into the atmosphere [and the whole cycle repeats at that time as it has for billions of years].
So, as a store of carbon, trees are not remotely equivalent to it being locked away in coal seams and oil reservoirs deep underground [or on other planets, or in locked vaults and storage units, where the keepers can charge rent governments will have to pay. We need to stop corporate polluting and start planting more regionally-appropriate trees]. More
Rob MacKenzie, Richard Norby and The Conversation via Inverse (inverse.com), 8.18, 24; mycologist Paul Stamets, "How Psilocybin Mushrooms Can Help Save the World" at SXSW 2023; CC Liu, Crystal Q., Seth Auberon (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly
MAPS fails to get approval for MDMA (ecstasy, molly); can it get shrooms legalized?
Inside the Biggest (Magical) Mushroom Festival in North America | Telluride Mushroom Festival
(North Spore) Premiered July 24, 2024: Visit: northspore.com. Join Lou from North Spore as he explores the biggest, oldest, and most magical mushroom festival in North America in Telluride, Colorado. From foraging with mycologist Alan Rockefeller in the picturesque San Juan Mountains, to a private lunch with Chef Graham Steinruck, and participating in the wildest and wackiest mushroom parade in the world, this video has something for everyone. Use this link to get 10% off 2024 ticket (events.humanitix.com/telluride).
(TED Talks) Paul Stamets on 6 ways mushrooms can save the world
The Psychedelic Sangha
Welcome home, Misfit Seekers! TPS holds space for Psychedelic Buddhism. TPS promotes a non-sectarian and non-traditional approach to Buddhism that values the spiritual efficacy of psychedelics on the Path, not to mention great music and art.
The Psychedelic Sangha was cofounded in 2018 as a spiritual refuge for Buddhistic Psychonauts and Psychedelic Buddhists — “misfit seekers” — looking for a safe place to practice.
Incubation is Step One and refers to all sober preparatory events, such as Morning Meditation on IG Live (Monday-Friday) or weekly Sunday Sit series on Zoom. Also included in this category is the Speaker Series and upcoming conference, Psychedelic Buddhism 2024.
Invocation is Step Two and includes “dose-friendly” events, such as the Bardo Bath Series, Psychedelic Severance, Vibing Vajrasattva, and Museum Meets (aka “Museum Dose”). These events are designed to provide a safe space for exploration, with onsite risk/harm reduction facilitators.
Integration is Step Three, the final step: reintegrate the pieces through a sober peer-to-peer sharing circle and group sit. There is no therapy, just community validation and a safe space to be heard.
TPS also offers a comprehensive 6-8-week private cohort program with a carefully designed course of study and practice that guides practitioners through all three phases of this Third Eye System. The next private cohort is starting fall-winter 2024.
The definition of “psychedelic” is an altered state of consciousness that helps reveal the nature of mind and reality — regardless of whether it is drug-induced, meditation-induced, or life-induced [even death-induced for anyone.
TPS always seeks friends and collaborators who want to create great Dharma Art. Please feel free to email TPS. And join the mailing list below to receive bi-monthly communiqué, The Oracle: “All Things to Come.”
TPS invite everyone to exercise cognitive liberty and join for a transformative experience.
“The challenge is to imagine and then create a communal structure that works, not in theory, but in practice. We must be ready to learn from whatever historical alternative models already exist: from the noncelibate yogic tradition of the Tibetan Nyingma school to the Japanese system of hereditary priests, and to proceed free from attachment to the outcome. We also need to learn from history’s mistakes and work to create a sangha that is no longer ridden with the sectarianism, dogmatism, authoritarianism, and sexism endemic to many Asian traditions.”
“It is possible the next Buddha will not take the form of [a heroic] individual. The next Buddha may take the form of a community, a community practicing understanding and lovingkindness, a community practicing mindful living. And the practice can be carried out as a group, as a city, as a nation.”
We converged right on time. I had a basket full of mushrooms I'd hunted down in a woven basket ready for identification. The prizes were very large chanterelles (Cantharellus californicus?), but it was not to be. With years as a mycologist, our prolific wilderness author and Nature Guide Christopher Nyerges scoffed. They were hollow and seemed to have gills. But what caught his eye were some false morels he had spotted nearby. I found these near the stream a distance from our gathering spot. They are in abundance at this time. But what is not is the delicious tree oyster, which previously could always be depended on in some fallen logs and living specimens. They're saprotrophic. Then we set off in search of stinging nettle, chickweed, lambs quarter (Chenopodium, a kind of local quinoa), horehound, blewits, and false morels, which were collected boiled, drained, then sauteed in olive oil with a few potato flakes sprinkled in at the end. They had no salt but were delicious in our hearty vegan soup with bouillon and miso powder we brought along.
Fire is fun and a necessary survival skill.
We learned to make fire by the four methods -- chemical, electrical, mechanical (friction), and solar. A lighter is always good, but a simple clear plastic magnifier works wonders. Two used batteries and steel wool is even better (no sun required), mugwort as kindling and a little breath of life. But the most fun was derived from rubbing two sticks together, a near impossible feat. Some, however, are naturals and can do it in under 30 seconds. Most will not succeed in 30 minutes of trying, hands calloused and arms exhausted.
The soup was wonderful, salty and rich, full of fresh picked greens. And we learned to recognize spurge, poison oak, elderberry, everlasting, wild cherry, acorns (oak nuts), polypores like turkey tail and chicken of the woods (with some chanterelle lookalikes called Jack o' lanterns Omphalotus olivascens), possible agaricus and Lactarius deliciosus, and some mystery mushrooms yet to be keyed, spore printed, and positively identified. The best part is that Nyerges is a wealth of knowledge with a wry sense of humor, constantly playing off his two foils, dedicated students with comedic routines at the ready.
A more intense wild plant and mushroom foraging nature walk awaits explorers next Saturday morning (see below) from the School of Self-Reliance
Saturday, March 9th
Wild Plants (Chris Nyerges)
At 10:00 am join in as we explore the ethnobotanical treasures of the wild areas of Los Angeles. We'll learn about the common wild foods in season and the many introduced useful plants (mostly from Europe). Many native foods that have been used for millennia, and recent rains have caused them to bloom along with mushroom springing up in the area. We will be examining plants useful for making fire without matches.
On Saturday, March 16, 10:00 am-2:00 pm, spring foraging gets underway as part of the School of Self-Reliance's ETHNOBOTANY SERIES. Spring is the peak of leaf production, when native and non-native plants sprout up everywhere. It’s usually a bit cooler, and everything is going green.
However, in Southern California, we have had only light rain most of the time, so many areas were drying up before the sudden blessing of abundant rain. This means what is available now has changed. We'll learn which plants are useful as food and how to collect them sustainably.
In some cases, learning how to recognize sprouts can lead to plans to come back to a spot for harvesting.
The newer growth of the prickly pear cactus or nopal occurs now, so this is the best time to gather them. (But they can be harvested year-round).
Some tree barks are best collected now, such as willow. Some fruits occur early, and we’ll see them in the woods. Some non-natives (invasives), like the mustards, flower early and can be readily collected and used as food or medicine.
Learn how some of these can be dried and stored for later use.
Learn what the edible salad plants are likely growing right in our backyards, in the neighborhood, and in wild areas this spring.
Learn which plants can be foraged and made into nutritious foods with simple recipes. We’ll examine images and learn about diverse uses.
We’ll also share a way to look at the environment to see what the future will bring in terms of foraging. Seasonal Foraging walks are offered four times to “read” the environment. It's a great survival skill.
Location: Upper Arroyo. Registrants will be sent the exact meeting location. Bring drinking water.
Neil deGrasse Tyson, StarTalk, 2/8/24; Dhr. Seven, Pat Macpherson (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly
The Mystery of Mushrooms [human relatives] with Neil deGrasse Tyson and Bryn Dentinger
Humans are related to mushrooms.
(StarTalk) StarTalk Podcast Full Episodes.
Why are some mushrooms delicious culinary truffles, some make us high (200 "magic mushroom" types), and some kill us?
Neil deGrasse Tyson and comedian Chuck Nice discover the weird world of mushrooms, psilocybin (natural psychedelic drug), and mycelia (root-like fibers that communicate between plants and distribute nutrients throughout forest) with mycologist (person who studies fungus) Bryn Dentinger.
What is a mycologist? Discover the kingdom of fungi, the crazy chemicals funguses produce, and how mushrooms (the fruiting bodies of the mycelia) have a closer common ancestor to us than plants.
00:00 - Introduction: psilocybin mushrooms
0:41 - What is mycology?
3:46 - What is psilocybin?
5:03 - How the asteroids helped the mushrooms
8:08 - When did humans start eating 'shrooms?
12:26 - Why are mushrooms so hard to grow?
15:18 - Mycelium and large organisms
20:45 - Psilocybin vs. Ayahuasca
26:00 - Should we farm mushrooms more?
28:45 - Does life have similarities to the framework of the universe?
31:26 - Why are truffles so rare?
33:47 - Mushrooms on a Mars settlement
37:30 - Fungi and the human microbiome
42:22 - Progress in research
43:48 - Biochemical wizards
45:07 - New species of shrooms
51:17 - The Last of Us fungal plague
How did the asteroid that is thought to have killed off the dinosaurs help the mushrooms? When did humans start using mushrooms for their psychedelic (entheogenic, shamanistic, mind-making) effects?
Mycelia feed the root hairs, and tree gives sugar
Why are mushrooms so hard to grow? Learn about the differences between fungal and plant life. Learn how mycelia are some of the largest single organisms by area in the world, with the largest living organism on earth planet being a giant, underground hyphae of mycelium, a massive fungal mat that is three square miles in area, living in the Blue Mountains of Oregon.
The Blue Mountains are unique as the home of the world's largest living organism, a subterranean colonial mycelial mat of the fungusArmillaria ostoyae[6]. They were named after the color of the mountains when seen from a distance and the blue hue imparted by the smoke of forest and range fires set by Indigenous people as management tools in the fall [7]. More
How did some mushrooms come to be hallucinogenic? Should we be farming more mushrooms?
What makes prized mushrooms like expensive truffles so rare? Why can’t we farm them rather than have to wildcraft them with the help of pigs their incredible sense of smell?
Many mushrooms are culinary and medicinal.
Could fungi be the key to feeding a future Mars settlement? Will mycelia and mushrooms replace meat with their texture, flavor, and environment-friendly production methods.
Learn about what fungi are made of biochemically and how many new species of fungi are found everyday.
How do fungi interact with the human microbiome? What is Auto-Brewery Syndrome [where a person gets drunk by fermentation in the human gut]?
Plus, could a fungus-based plague cause a zombie apocalypse like the disease featured in The Last of Us?
ABOUT: Science meets pop culture on StarTalk. Astrophysicist and Hayden Planetarium Director Neil deGrasse Tyson, comic co-hosts, guest celebrities, and scientists discuss astronomy, physics, and everything else about life in the universe. Keep Looking Up! #StarTalk #neildegrassetyson. Follow or subscribe to StarTalk: Twitter: startalkradio, Facebook: startalk, Instagram: startalk.
For more information about this artist and her work, visit Inuit Gallery of Vancouver. https://inuit.com/. Thanks to Patrons Jack Hill, The Fantasy GOAT, Andrew Gendreau, ND, Vijai Karthigesu, Shellz, and Jeff Lane for supporting us this week.
About the prints that flank Neil in this video:
"Black Swan” & "White Swan" limited edition serigraph prints by Coast Salish artist Jane Kwatleematt Marston. Support us on Patreon: startalkradio.
NOTE: StarTalk+ Patrons can listen to this entire episode commercial-free.
Get the NEW StarTalk book, "To Infinity and Beyond: A Journey of Cosmic Discovery" on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3PL0NFn
12:00-1:30 pm "Grow Wine Cap Mushrooms for Soil Health and Food" with Olga Tzogas of Smugtown Mushrooms
Learn how to grow wine cap mushrooms with Olga Tzogas of Smugtown Mushrooms and take home spawn for your own bed: Private residence - North Hollywood, CA 91601
Survival Skills and Self Reliance with nature guide Christopher Nyerges
(Adventurers' Club) Streamed live 9/29/22: Nature guide Christopher Nyerges was always interested in living in nature. He was fascinated with people like the Native Americans and Amish who actually did it. After high school, he moved to his grandfather's farm in Ohio and continued his botanical and mycological (mushroom) studies.
He was concerned about the fate of Western culture and believed that we all needed to get back to basics by learning how to make and fix things, how to grow food, and how to employ natural healing techniques. He began teaching wild food and survival skills in 1974 and has taught over 40,000 students.
During this presentation, he shows some of the plants that can provide nutrition and shares some healing methods that are as old as ancient Greek Hippocrates. He is an advocate of frugality and simplicity, making do with less. Not everyone agrees with his approach, but he proves it's possible to survive anywhere. He teaches bushcraft skills to the public through the School of Self-Reliance.
NDT; BuzzFeed; Pat Macpherson, Seth Auberon (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly
I'm richer and get better drugs than you, Neil.
Tyson, an American [actor,] astrophysicist, author, and science communicator, shared one thing that keeps him up at night, leaving Rogan speechless.
On Tyson's TikTok, the famed astrophysicist, known for bringing science to the masses, shared a clip captioned, “We have more in common with mushrooms than you think.”
With his 4.8 million followers, it is no wonder that the clip quickly went viral. The comment section was on fire, with many making fun of the host [Joe Rogan].
One user wrote, “This is why I love Neil. He makes science understandable for everyone, even Joe Rogan.”
Another shared, “Joe Rogan had no idea what he was talking about during this whole interview, and it’s awesome.” More:
We gathered in Hahamongna, the ancient meeting place of the local Native Americans, variously known as the Tongva, Kizh, or Gabrielinos.
Under a rising sun and streaming persistent chemical trails -- like cobwebs strewn across the sky -- we defined mushrooms as the "fruiting bodies" of mycelium, the magic underground filament structures that build forests, nourish trees, breakdown woodland debris, and make available the minerals and elements necessary for chlorophyll-based organisms, the flowers, baby greens, and grasses in bloom all around us.
Armed only with knowledge, the peaceful troupe proceeded into the woods. There we met the polypore on the side of logs, matted mycelium in the mulch, purple blewits, whitish russala, black inkcaps, a reishi-lookalike, and LBMs.
Inkcap mushroom sprouting among the verdant greens (Emmy)
Easter egg hunt find, a young, oval inkcap with veil (Emmy)
Inkcap beginning to droop and melt into black ink (Emmy)
Blewit with purple stem over a bed of chickweed and nettles (Emmy)
Above all the action are the fruiting bodies sending out spores to further the mycelium.
Below every mushroom (fruiting body) is the mycelium (root-like filament structures)
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The sacred "fruit" of Judeo-Christianity
The local acorns littered the path, and found European stinging nettle crowding out the chickweed at the base of the ancient oaks in the grove, where the mycelium was delivering nutrients. We meditated with blewits in hand, spotted turkey tail shelf mushrooms hiding behind a spreading vine, met the sacred datura (moonflower), California sagebrush, white sage, castor bean and other invasives, toyon berries, black sage, coyote bush, coast live oak, pine needles bursting with Vitamin C, saw bunnies, ducks, fish, quail, squirrels, as P-22 (Los Angeles' own mascot puma/mountain lion for the last ten years) was being eulogized at the Greek Theater in Griffith Park, simulcast live on Pasadena City College's local NPR affiliate (scpr.org).
It made me love Nature again.
We ended with hugs and handshakes, Native American and Buddhist wisdom delivered appropriate to opening up to our lives, to our senses, and mindful in our approach to issues arising in the gray asphalt world we came from and were returning to.
But for a time, we were green devis and devas, unseen woodland fairies frolicking as we learned that Scandinavian Santa Claus, Sami shamans, and Easter egg hunts are all based on mushroom lore. Special thanks to our guide, Seven, and Christopher Nyerges and other instructors at the School of Self-Reliance. See everyone tomorrow at the Wild Mushroom Fair 2023, South Coast Botanic Garden, Palos Verdes Peninsula, Los Angeles.
Mushroom hunt, wild plant foraging, nature walk in the local woods, Feb. 4, 2023
In nature, in the wild, all things have a purpose.
Mushroom hunt, wild edible plant foraging, nature walk, and mushroom meditation led by Native American student of author and expert Christopher Nyerges (schoolofself-reliance.com) in the Arroyo Seco area (near JPL) of the Hahamongna Watershed Park opposite La Canada High School: $30.
Visit us at Wild Mushroom Fair
We’ll venture into the arroyo through weeping willows and derelict waterways to see the greening flora of a sunny California winter. We'll explore the spiritual and medicinal dimension of mushrooms.
We're in search of specimens, wild foods of the Tongva, and the riparian plants of Tongavaar (as the Native Americans called Los Angeles).
During this mushroom hunt and nature walk, we’ll learn about the amazing things that grow and the many uses of what we find -- oaks (acorns), sages, blewits, tree oysters, nettles, mulefat, mugwort, horehound, willow, mallow, and so on.
There are many plants, which we may or may not see, depending on conditions. We are sure to see many wild edibles that sprout at this time of year when it’s wet alongside mushrooms sprouting chaotic from their beds.
Cooking/preparation tips of the edibles we find will be discussed. (Not all beautiful things are edible). There are always lots of surprises.
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