MUSHROOMS CAN BITE IN OTHER WAYS

We are all familiar with the many ways that mushrooms may cause toxic or fatal reactions after eating them. This is bad enough, but the subjects of my interest and admiration have found other sneakier ways to do us in as well!

Although the myth persists that the explanation for the occasional toxicity seen with certain mushrooms in only some individuals, but not all, after ingestion is one due to allergy, real evidence to support this popular assertion is very hard to come by. I am aware of one case following eating of Sulfur Shelfs that almost certainly was an allergy. The symptoms were not from the intestinal tract however; they were referable to the skin in the form of hives and most seriously, some initial tightening of the larynx. The mushroom was not fresh and one other person ate parts of the same mushroom without ill effect.

I also have only been able to find but one case of a person breaking out in a rash (something like poison ivy) from merely handling a mushroom, but even this case was not clear cut. It occurred in a worker who grew mushrooms commercially and in addition to his contact with the mushrooms, he had recently sprayed them with an insecticide, a material much more likely to have caused his rash.

Speaking of mushroom growers, they have other problems. A disease known as hypersensitivity pneumonitis sometimes occurs in these people. This disease is a much more serious and complicated form of allergy and is usually due to the bacteria and molds that grow in the compost, but some cases have been reported from Japan where it was caused by the spores of the mushroom being cultivated, Pleurotus ostreatus, our common Oyster Mushroom. This is commonly found in supermarkets these days, but there is no harm from them to the ordinary consumer.


In New Jersey, a few people suffering from seasonal hay fever were found to be sensitive to mold spores rather than pollen. The air was unusually laden with fungal spores. It appeared that the offending agent was spores from Ganoderma applanatum (Artist Conch) which enjoyed a particularly heavy fruiting in that locality and which produces prodigious amounts of spores.

One form of endocarditis results from microorganisms, usually bacteria, growing on diseased heart valves. It is a chronic, serious disease unless treated properly. In 1971 a man died from this disease after failing to respond to conventional antibiotic therapy which is extremely effective against bacterial causes of this disease. His heart valves proved to be infected with a fungus that most of the medical mycologists could not identity. Cultures of it were sent to various laboratories and finally an agricultural lab figured out that it was the imperfect (non-fruiting) stage of a Coprinus most likely Coprinus lagopus.

That covers intestinal, pulmonary, and even cardiac systems, but there is one more and much more common. Enthusiasts who examine mushrooms closely often resort to breaking apart the specimen in various ways and in so doing, tiny amounts of liquid may get on the fingers. No problem unless you later happen to absent-mindedly wipe your eyes with these same fingers. This will produce an intense burning which may require medical treatment. The juice of the mushroom (Lentinellus ursinus, the Bear Mushroom) is extremely acrid in taste as well.

Then there is a guy I know who got chased out of a pasture by an enraged bull while he was collecting mushrooms, but that is another story.