Subject: Growing truffles

From: [email-masked] (Damian Haslam)
Date: 29 Jul 1995 07:17:13 GMT

Sorry for stuffing up.. but in fact, my brother wants to grow truffles 
(the French kind?). I'm very gratefull for all the help people have 
mailed me so far.. but I still haven't found anything that tells me how 
to grow the little buggers. I am however, getting pretty knowledgeable  
in general truffle-trivia!

So if someone could email me some hints on how to grow them, or somehwere 
to find some hints on how to grow them, i would be most gratefull.

Thanks in advance

-damian

-- 
*-- Damian J. K. Haslam - [email-masked] -------------------*
Striving to derive the expression for the intensity distribution developed
by a double slit illuminated by monochromotic waves.
*-- [email-masked] ---------- [email-masked] --*

---

From: [email-masked] ("K N and P J Harris")
Date: Tue, 1 Aug 1995 09:05:46 GMT

Truffles aren't easy.
You need:- The right fungus, the right host, the right climate and the 
right soil. (and quite a lot of patience, they are not like field 
mushrooms).
The experts are the French with research programmes run by INRA, close 
behind are the Italians with some research programmes. Try a search on 
G.Paccioni who was conducting expts in Italy.
The French were preparing ready infected tree seedlings for setting up 
"Truffle Nurseries". Could be probbies with importing them though.

Truffle species:
TUBER MELANOSPORUM The Perigord Truffle - this is the black one that 
everyone goes mad about (could it be all those naughty pheromones !)
TUBER MAGNATUM The white Truffle. Found in deciduous woods in northern 
Italy - close runner up to the above.
TUBER AESTIVUM the Summer Truffle - the only knd that grows in UK and 
very difficult to find even then. Our last British commercial truffle 
hunter threw the towel in decades ago (1930). This one IS edible but not 
in the same league as the other two. Was most commonly found in Beech 
woods on chalky soils.
I used to have a little more info back in the Dept and if I can find it 
I will mail you from there.
Peter Harris,
Department of Soil Science,
The UNIVERSITY of READING,
UK>
AKA <[email-masked]>

---

From: roger <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 01 Aug 95 19:06:22 GMT

> TUBER AESTIVUM the Summer Truffle - the only knd that grows in UK and 

There is AFAIK another UK variety which is in season during the
autumn and winter. As a child in Somerset, I remember finding them with 
little trouble. They grow in woods with a mixture of oak, ash and birch
and are reddish brown. They are superior in flavour to T. Aestivum
and a fair bit larger too. I'll try to find a reference.

Roger
-- 
______________________________________________________________________________
               A dragon in shallows falls victim to shrimps.
______________________________________________________________________________