Fungarium: Welcome to the Museum

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Another nail in the coffin comes from Dr Dennis when he described the ‘specimens’ odour as like that of “old or heated India rubber” - likely referring to the scorched elastic strands protruding from the golf ball’s inner ‘gleba’. There are samples of fungi from all seven continents, spanning the entire fungal tree of life and representing well over half of known global diversity. BBC Radio 4 presenter Sheila Dillon recently revealed she has taken mushroom supplements after her cancer treatment. Photograph: BBC

Los hongos están de moda, aunque siento que es más por el tema de las drogas y su carácter lúdico, y menos por las razones que me gustarían. Extracts of turkey tail have been used as mainstream cancer treatments since the 1970s in Japan and 1980s in China. “Turkey tail is an immune system regulator,” says Baxter. “It’s very good for lung cancers and a lot of different cancers.” Our Lion’s Mane was cloned from a species we found growing just 300m from our farm near Bristol. As much as possible we utilise native strains, not only to help us get closer once again to the medicine of this land – where so much of the knowledge has been lost – but most importantly to have as little effect as possible on local biodiversity and ultimately tread as lightly as possible on the earth. Ester Gaya is a senior research leader at Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew, England. She began her career in mycology in Spain and lived in the US before settling in the UK. She has spent the past twenty years researching fungi and is especially fascinated by lichens and their evolutionary process.Another group of pathogenic fungi we have in our collection, yet far more grotesque, are the Cordyceps fungi. These are the so-called 'zombie' fungi - their spores will infect insects and arachnids and slowly infest its body. After a while, when the fungus has become totally pervasive inside the unfortunate insect, it starts to take over it's biochemistry and alter it’s behaviour; the insect is driven to climb a plant and hang on. From there, the insect dies and the fungus sends its fruiting body bursting out of the corpse, sending out thousands of spores to infect more victims. As gruesome as this sounds, it can also be spectacularly beautiful to see the final fruiting fungus. This group of fungi are also of great importance to human welfare, as some of their mycochemicals have medicinal uses. Most of the immuno-suppressant drugs taken by transplant patients are derived from a chemical called cyclosporin that comes from a Cordyceps fungus. Another chemical, cordycepin, is currently being investigated for potential uses in treating cancers by restricting their spread throughout the patient's body. The only UK-grown organic certified Reishi Mushroom Tincture. All our mushrooms are grown on an organic mushroom farm in the green county of Somerset UK, and are certified by the Soil Association. Our organic functional mushroom tinctures are triple extracted with distilled water and organic UK ethanol. In conclusion, Bristol Fungarium's medicinal mushroom tinctures are a true gift from nature. They offer a natural and holistic approach to supporting overall well-being, and I have experienced firsthand the positive impact they have on my health. With their exceptional quality, sustainable practices, and outstanding customer service, Bristol Fungarium has set the bar high for the medicinal mushroom industry. I wholeheartedly recommend their tinctures to anyone looking to enhance their vitality and embrace the healing power of mushrooms.

Hay en el mundo de los hongos un verdadero apartado de terror. Los hongos no solo pueden infectar o enfermar a otros organismos, como los insectos, sino que en algunas ocasiones pueden liberar sustancias químicas capaces de manipular el cerebro de ellos y tomar el control de su cuerpo al más parecido estilo "zombi". In 1961, under the Morton Agreement, the mycological collections of the Natural History Museum (except for lichenized fungi) were transferred to Kew, substantially increasing the collections. D.A. Reid became head of mycology in 1975, D.N. Pegler in 1987, and B.M. Spooner in 1998. In 2009, the extensive collections of microfungi and plant pathogenic fungi held by CABI (the IMI collections) were transferred to Kew to create the largest collection of dried fungi in the world. B.T.M. Dentinger succeeded B.M. Spooner in 2012 and is the current head of section. We are also proud to have fungi collected by John Ray, Charles Darwin, Alexander von Humboldt and many other famous naturalists around the world. to merge the fungal systematics expertise and resources of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and CABI,Katie Scott graduated from University of Brighton in 2011. Her work draws influences from traditional medical and botanical illustration, both in aesthetic and subject matter. It also plays with the ideas of scientific uncertainty and speculation, fabricating the inner and outer workings of the world. Her illustrations depict a familiar yet fantasy vision of plants, humans, and minerals. UK-grown organic Reishi mushroom supplement, cloned in our lab and extracted in the tincture kitchen on our mushroom farm in Somerset. Under UK law, food labelling cannot “attribute to any foodstuff the property of preventing, treating or curing a human disease”. Such claims fall under medicines regulations and require marketing authorisation from the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA). A spokesperson for the MHRA said it had received no marketing applications for products containing lion’s mane, turkey tail, reishi, cordyceps, chaga or shiitake, and that a number of retailers had been warned about making health claims for mushroom products and use of the term “medicinal mushrooms”. Dozens of claims are made for medicinal mushroom products. The Bristol Fungarium, for example, sells extracts of fungi that it says relieve anxiety, prevent wrinkle formation, stabilise blood pressure and ease hot flushes. From heart health and type 2 diabetes to allergies and cancers, the list of ailments that mushrooms are said to alleviate is long. But are these claims supported by scientific evidence? Or are medicinal mushrooms just the latest fad?

The British National Collections comprise around 300,000 specimens, covering the whole of the UK. Based on it's long history the collection is likely to contain specimens representing a significant proportion of the genera known to occur in the UK. Each bottle of our organic Reishi tincture contains 128g of Reishi fruiting body*. Because our supply chain is so much shorter, and we prepare our tincture in comparatively small batches, you can be sure that the extracts you buy from us haven’t lost bio-active compounds due to sitting around for a long time or being shipped halfway across the world. *fresh value Lions Mane is a saprophytic mushroom with a long history of use in Traditional medicine protocols, as well as being of great importance to the Yamabushi Buddhist monks of Japan for defence and as a tool for clarity during meditation. The benefits of this widely revered functional mushroom have been utilised and continually studied for centuries.

Introduction

The Fungarium is split into the British National Collections (held under the National Heritage Act) and the Overseas Collections. All collections (except the Myxomycota and some material maintained in spirit) are kept in green boxes in compactor units.

Nota Bene: This book is part of the outstanding Welcome to the Museum Series, which are uniformly excellent. There are quite a few, some of which include: Planetarium, Dinosaurium, Botanicum, Historium, and Animalium. Also, I would like to mention the exceptional customer service provided by Bristol Fungarium. The team is incredibly knowledgeable, passionate, and always ready to answer any questions I have about their products. They go above and beyond to ensure customer satisfaction, which creates a sense of trust and confidence in their brand. Admito que compré este libro por sus hermosas ilustraciones y terminé enamorándome del contenido, aunque en un par de ocasiones lo llegué a sentir demasiado inundado de un vocabulario muy especializado. Resumo brevemente algunas cosas que captaron mi curiosidad: the introduction of a formal accessions system, each specimen being logged in a series of ledgers andFungi underpin all life on earth and yet it’s estimated that over 95% of fungal species remain unknown.