Legend and truth about mushrooms
There is a legend that myceliums appear in places where lightning strikes. The Arabs considered mushrooms “children of thunder”, the Egyptians and the ancient Greeks called them “food of the gods”. Over time, people changed their views on mushrooms and made them the main food during the fasting period, and even began to use their healing properties. However, Hare Krishnas still do not eat mushrooms. China is considered the most important mushroom lover. The Chinese have used mushrooms for medicinal purposes since ancient times.
Let’s figure out what a mushroom is. It is 90% water, just like a baby’s body. In the XNUMXst century AD, the Roman writer Pliny attached mushrooms to a separate group, distinct from plants. Then people abandoned this point of view. Science began to take the view that the fungus is a plant. However, with a more detailed scientific view, significant differences were established between the fungus and any plants. And now science has isolated the mushroom into a new, completely independent species.
Mushrooms live everywhere, both on the ground and under water, and on living wood, and on hemp, as well as other natural materials. Mushrooms interact with almost all terrestrial living and plant creatures and are a very important part of the ecological system of our planet.
Such unusual creatures as mushrooms, which drive lovers of quiet hunting crazy, decompose the complex bodies of the organic world into simple ones, and these “simple” ones again begin to participate in the “circulation of substances in nature”, and again provide food to “complex” organisms. They are one of the main actors in this cycle.
Surprisingly, despite the fact that the fungus has existed on Earth throughout the entire existence of mankind, the latter has not yet determined its attitude towards mushrooms. The peoples of different countries are not equally related to the same mushrooms. Mushroom poisoning, both accidental and intentional, played a significant role in this.
If you look at today, in many countries no one picks mushrooms. For example, in America and some other countries, the so-called “wild” mushrooms that grow in the forest are almost never collected. Most often, mushrooms are grown on an industrial scale, or imported from other countries.