Mushrooms: forest alternative?
By Paul Fattig | Mail Tribune
May 12, 2006

CAVE JUNCTION — Mushrooms popping up on the forest floor, given their potential medicinal properties, could provide an economic alternative to cutting tall timber in the region.

That conclusion by a group of Illinois Valley residents was one of several economic options proposed for emerging forest-based business opportunities during a Thursday evening forum called "Beyond Logging: Building Local Forest Wealth."

"From new medicines to ecotourism, our forests are worth far more to residents of the Illinois Valley as old-growth stands than stumps," said Eric Cerecedes who represents Mycosphere Inc., which he described as a local "for-profit activist organization" focusing on the economic potential of medicinal mushrooms. The group supports an economically and ecologically sustainable community, he said.

Speaking earlier in the day, Cerecedes said the goal isn't to eliminate all logging on local federal forestland but to broaden the economic base in an environmentally-friendly manner. Recent scientific discoveries indicate that mushrooms, including several that grow locally, may offer treatment for a variety of illness, from AIDS to smallpox, he said. Others have shown they can be used to detoxify everything from nerve gas to oil, he said.

For instance, one local mushroom — schizophyllan — has been shown to restore mitosis of bone marrow cells previously suppressed by anti-cancer drugs, he said. Another — pleurotus ostreatus — produces a key enzyme in cholesterol metabolism, he added.

But mushrooms are only a portion of the potential alternatives, he said, noting that could include other forest-friendly products and tourism.

Old-growth areas in the region are worth more standing than they are as saw logs. "We could support our full economy without destroying what we have for the future generations," he said.

Selma resident Orville Camp agreed. The longtime area resident, who has been working for some four decades on his family-owned forest, has coined the word "ecostry" to describe his natural selection process for logging his land.

Roger Brandt, an Oregon Caves National Monument employee, estimated that nature-based tourism could help local businesses benefit from the nearly $30 million that tourists bring to the Redwood Highway corridor each year.

The choice isn't between logging or the alternatives, said Mycosphere's Paul West.

"We have some of the richest resources in the United States here," Paul West said. "But we really haven't been seeing the forest for the trees."