ECOLOGY


           Morels are the fruiting body of a fungus that primarily lives underground.  They are ectomycorrhizal fungi of the family Morchella, to which all species of morel belong.  The word ‘ectomycorrhizal’ may seem complicated, but simply put, it is a fungus (myco) that lives in a mutualistic symbiotic relationship with plants on the outside (ecto) of their roots (rhizo).  The primary structure of the morel is called the mycelium.  It is an underground branching network of individual fungal hyphae which form in mass to create the thread-like underground network that gives it a relatively huge surface area.  Hyphae are the individual fibrous filaments that grow out as extensions of the mycelial mass.  The hyphae attach to plant roots in this underground network to serve as affectively as a microscopic root extender.  Both the plant and the fungus benefit from their relationship, where the plant gives the fungus carbohydrates, which the fungus uses for its energy source, and the mycelium transports water with dissolved mineral nutrients to the plants. 

                    The morel that we eat is the fruiting body sent up from the sclerotia, the dense mass created by the mycelia that weathers winter conditions.  Every year in the early spring, the sclerotia has to decide whether to form new mycelium or to produce a fruiting body.  Only with the proper combination of soil nutrition, humidity, carbon dioxide concentration, and temperature will it decide to send up a fruiting body (Volk & Thomas 1999).  The idea is that the sclerotia will decide to release spores when the plant it has been in symbiosis with is dead or dying.  It will then send up the delicious fruiting body which is aerodynamically designed to exploit wind currents in the transmission of its spores.  If conditions are not met to send up a mushroom, the sclerotia will produce new mycelium, and continue to do so until conditions are met.  Here in the PNW, it can be anywhere from decades to several hundred years before an area gets burned, but the mycelia are surviving year after year, unobservable from the surface. 

 

HISTORY


        Any picker can go out to a prime location at a prime time with a paring knife, buckets, and a vehicle large enough to hold the bounty, ideally…  Many morel hunters will recall the feeling of what it was like to walk into the jackpot post-burn and see them popping up across the charred landscape, or wherever exactly they may be.  The pickers are all going for morels, but everybody got there somehow on their own and for a different reason.  There are circuit pickers that travel anywhere from Alaska to northern California in a season, there are plenty of locals commercial pickers, and then there are the locals who go and pick for themselves and the very informal economies of restaurant back doors.  

 

ECONOMICS

     Morels can be eaten fresh or can be dried, preserving them for years.  They are traded commercially in both forms.  People and restaurants can buy dried morels in stores in any season and reconstitute them for a meal.  Because they preserve for so long, their economics are nowhere near as interesting as fresh morels, which are subject to market fluxes.  Once the fresh product is picked, it must be sold immediately.  Morels are pricedbased on their quality, as well as when in the season they are picked. 

     There is little processing for morels aside from their safe storage and refrigeration in the case of fresh morels.  Dried morels can be packaged before being distributed.  They tend to be in more ‘progressive’ grocery stores nowadays fresh, but more often dried and packaged.  They can also be shipped to a wider audience nationally and internationally when dried and sold in areas where they have never really seen morels.  This also serves to introduce people to something from PNW forests, and can help lead to a better understanding of the importance of preserving natural habitats. 

POLICY AND MANAGEMENT

     Every Forest Service and BLM jurisdiction in Oregon has its own specifics laws concerning the removal of morels from the forest.  The Willamette National Forest does not require permits for personal use.  Personal use is defined as being less that 2 gallons/day for less than 10 days/year.  Beyond that, one must purchase a commercial use permit, which has no limit on the quantity one can harvest.  One can either purchase a pass for a certain number of days for $2/day with a minimum of 10 days, or one can purchase a year pass for $100.  These permits are actually valid for all mushroom species besides matsutake, which have specific regulations regarding their harvest.  There are similar rules across many of Oregon’s national forests, though some do not issue permits, and some have more complicated local rules.  There are Forest Service and BLM enforcement officers who periodically check the forests to make sure the pickers have their proper permits.  Buyers of any NTFPs in Oregon must obtain information from the picker as part of a record keeping law.  The buyer must obtain from the picker their name, address, phone number, license plate number of the vehicle used, and one form of permission which can either be in the case of harvest on private or public land.  If the picker gathered on private land, the buyer must obtain the information about the landowner and see written permission.  If the picker gathered on public land, the buyer must get their permit number.  The buyer has to keep this information for one year as part of the recordkeeping law about NTFPs in Oregon or risk paying up to $1000 per infraction.  The buyer is responsible to the Fish and Game division of the police department (game warden). 


                                   

*Compiled from a paper by Jacob DeAngelo