#THERE IS A PIT IN MY STOMACH THE SIZE OF WESTERN AUSTRALIA

[100layersofdaddyissues]

I’m angry about ofmd so spoilers in the tags ignore me

[whatwelose]

Click listen above to hear the first full episode of my podcast series, Pyromorphology. In this episode, I discuss the "pyromorphing" of island biomes.

Our planet is filled with life Soundbite of Australian forest bird calls at dawn, and each living organism contains carbon. This richness of life, this richness of carbon, makes the planet highly combustible Soundbite of thunderclap. As noted by Bowman and others in their 2011 article, “The human dimension of fire regimes on Earth”, natural fire cycles, which have shaped ecosystems from savannah to rainforest, have been disrupted, and most fires are now human-caused Soundbite of fireplace crackling. The domestication of fire was a turning point in our evolution, and we have coexisted with fire for thousands of years. But global industrialization and anthropogenically-altered biogeography have created more lethal fires than we have previously recorded. The unknown effects of climate change on fire ecology heightens our inability to predict fire frequency and intensity. This podcast will seek to understand the impact of human-altered fire regimes on islands. Islands have been chosen as an initial example for the same reason that biogeographers such as E.O. Wilson and others have looked to islands to understand the processes of biodiversity. As stated in 2000 by Brown & Lomolino, islands... offer invaluable insights into how earth history, phylogenetic history, and contemporary and past environments have interacted to shape biodiversity.”

Soundbite Canoe paddles hitting the water

Human settlers of islands used fire to cremate the dead and keep the living warm on cold nights, but fire was also used to alter landscapes, to propagate plants and drive game in the direction of waiting hunters. The earliest evidence of human-caused fire in Australia is a cremation site dated from 24,000 BCE, and hearths have been found dating 30,000 to 15,000 BCE, as stated by Hallam in 2014. Hallam also states that given the presence of anthropogenic fire within giant marsupial habitat, it has been proposed that the extinction of species such as a sheep-sized echidna, a kangaroo which stood ten feet tall, and diprotodon, a relative of the wombat the size of a Volkswagen Beetle, all endemic megafauna of Australia, was caused by human alteration of the ecosystem. Increased burning can increase soil salinity, and the increasing amount of saltbush in the stomach contents of diprotodon serves as evidence of pyromorphing, or human alteration of a landscape. The Aboriginal culture is the oldest continuous culture of our planet, and stories of once freshwater lakes turned salty permeate their legends. The wilderness "discovered" by Europeans was really a managed landscape heavily altered by human hands.

Soundbite Bush fire roars

Slash and burn agriculture is another form of pyromorphology. Islands such as Madagascar are burning day by day, little family plot by little family plot. Slash and burn is a tragedy in which there are no villains- on average, families in Madagascar get by on less that $2 a day, and the poor forest soils are their richest just after a fresh burn. Parents do what is necessary to feed their families, and this is driving habitat loss and degradation. The island’s most iconic animal group, the lemurs, are also the world’s most threatened mammal group. Soundbite of Sifaka in Forest As noted by Schwitzer et al in 2014, averting the loss of Madagascar’s biodiversity requires community-based, ground up conservation management of remaining habitat. They also support the idea that ecotourism can inspire conservation of lemurs.

Soundbite of Cruise Ship Horn

While there is an unmistakable reek of colonialism in that idea, there is no stopping tourism to islands. In the Anthropocene era, islands can no longer be considered isolated outposts in a vast sea, as noted by Delgado et al in 2017. They note that one of the greatest threats to island biodiversity is homogenization. This homogenization extends to politics, as well. According to Kull and Laris’ 2009 research, Africans (and that does include the people of Madagascar in this context), have used fire for thousands of years, and many rural communities rely on fire for numerous livelihood activities. They note that government restrictions, often incited by international concern over forest loss, has led to a resistance by the people to stop their traditional burning. This and the combustibility of Madagascar’s wet-dry grassy landscapes near forests creates a standstill and the fires will continue to burn.

I have recorded today’s podcast in my overpriced apartment in a large city of the American West. Soundbite of Seattle Traffic near the Mariners Stadium While the fires of Madagascar seem worlds away, it is highly likely that I will need to leave my windows sealed and limit my time outdoors in the late summer months due to the smoke from wildfires. I could ask my own community members why we continue to lose control of fire and burn our own forests, and I can also share the wisdom of local expert, Smokey the Bear: Take notice of burn bans. When camping, use only established fire pits, keep your fires low so as to minimize sparks flying into nearby vegetation, and put your fire completely out with shovel-fulls of dirt and water. Remember: if it’s too hot to touch, it’s too hot to leave. And, please, don’t let your kids play with fireworks in the woods. Only you can prevent forest fires, you know.

Thank you for listening to today’s program.

Works Cited

Bowman, D. M., Balch, J., Artaxo, P., Bond, W. J., Cochrane, M. A., D’antonio, C. M., ... & Kull, C. A. (2011). The human dimension of fire regimes on Earth. Journal of biogeography, 38(12), 2223-2236.

Brown, J.H., & Lomolino, M.V. (2000). Concluding remarks: Historical perspective and the future of island biogeography Theory. Global Ecology and Biogeography, (1), 87.

Delgado, J. D., Riera, R., Rodriguez, R. A., Gonzalez-Moreno, P., & Maria Fernandez-Palacios, J. (2017). A reappraisal of the role of humans in the biotic disturbance of islands. Environmental Conservation, 44(4), 371–380.

Hallam, S. J. (2014). Fire and hearth: a study of Aboriginal usage and European usurpation in south-western Australia. Apollo Books.

Kull, C. A., & Laris, P. (2009). Fire ecology and fire politics in Mali and Madagascar. In Tropical fire ecology (pp. 171-226). Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.

Schwitzer, C., Mittermeier, R. A., Johnson, S. E., Donati, G., Irwin, M., Peacock, H., ... & Colquhoun, I. C. (2014). Averting lemur extinctions amid Madagascar's political crisis. Science, 343(6173), 842-843.

[verywildwildnature]

Mushrooms in pine forests

It’s mushroom season out there and I just returned from the first sell out workshop of the year.

I just wanted to write a post to clarify identity of the most common mushrooms you will find out there, just because they keep coming to the ‘show-and-tell’ table set up in the forest and is good to just be clear about those.

Lets start by saying that there are lots of mushrooms in Australia, an estimate of 5,000, of which only 5% has been described. That’s a lot of mushrooms without a name, leave alone edibility information.

So when out in the forest (or fields) you are really only just going to pick the one you know, the one you are confident about edibility and that have been described and tested and have been eaten by generations of mushroomers.

That is why when I run wild edible mushrooms workshops I only ever talk about two species: Saffron Milk Caps and Slippery Jacks. Yes there are other known edible mushrooms out there, like the wood blewits, grey knights and the elusive porcinis, but those are rare, and it would just be too much to learn for novice wild crafters, so I stick to the basics.

Once you empower yourself with the key features of the two edibles you cannot make mistakes, and that’s where you want to be.

KEY FEATURES OF SAFFRON MILK CAPS - LACTARIUS DELICIOSUS

Cap: reddish-orange with darker dots, 4-15cm in diameter. Flesh: soft, pale in the centre, stained reddish by milk around the edge. Gills: reddish, becoming flushed or spotted with green. Base: narrows towards the base, 2.5 – 5cm long, 2.5cm thick. Appearance: Reddish- orange, becoming green where bruised, spotted or pitted. Spores: cream in mass, broadly ellipsoid and average size 8.5 x 6.5 microns. Location: found in pine plantations across south eastern Australia, under older trees where the pine needles are thicker. Season: depending on condition (temperature and rain) from March to May.

KEY FEATURES OF SLIPPERY JACKS

A slimey mushroom, easily recognized by the cap. Great in soups and Asian dishes.

Cap: The cap is brown and up to 12 cm in diameter at maturity. The cap is initially hemispherical, later flattening out. It is slimy to the touch, bare, smooth, and glossy even when dry and the skin (cuticle) is easily peeled off. Underside: tiny, circular pores, at first light yellow but turn olive to dark yellow with maturity. Flesh: pale yellow or white, unchanging. Base: stout, rather short, 2.5 – 5cm long, with a large purplish-brown membranous ring. Spores: clay to ochre in mass, smooth, spindle-shaped, average size 8.5 x 3.3 microns. Location: found in pine plantations across south eastern and south western Australia, under older trees where the pine needles are thicker. Season: depending on condition (temperature and rain) from April to June.

First of all Fly agaricus - Amanita muscaria -, the classic fairytales toadstool. Yes they do exist, and they are as colourful as Dysney made them to be: bright red and white dots. Those are what I call the beacons, growing in the exact same location as the good ones, they highlight when the season is right, as you can spot them from afar. Amazingly photogenic, better be left in the forest. They start of as a little white textured bump to grow a red cap that opens in the classic umbrella shape. To say it right you could eat those, but only after several steps to leach out the toxins, in my opinion totally not worth it, as if you do not do it right you end up with a painful stomach ache (or worse). It is pretty easy to tell those apart when in full bloom, but when they are older they can discolour and the rain might wash away the withe dots. So if in doubt, flick them with a stick, the gills underneath would stay white no matter what = discard.

There are tales of tribal practices from eastern Europe, where the local shaman would eat this mushroom, drink lots of water to process the toxins through its liver to then distribute hallucinogenic urine to the villagers. But I shouldn’t talk of this on this blog, this is a family-friendly (PG) place..

Another common mushroom you want to leave in the forest is the Laughing Jim - Gymnopilus junonius - NOT edible. Some report refer to its bitter taste but most mushrooms experts advise against as there is reports of toxicity. This is a truly cosmopolitan mushroom, growing in clusters on dead woods, particularly stumps. It does needs a mention as it has somewhat similar appearance to the Slippery Jacks, but with gills in the underside.