from one plant to another via these logical evidence that humans used mycorrhizal networks . mushrooms as a food source as
It ’ s a complex dance of chemical communication between living tween 18,000-12,000 years ago !
early as the upper Paleolithic , be- forms that support the physical
Healthy soil is rich in aggregates , i . e ., literally clumps com- structure of soil . Plants , bacteria , and mycorrhizal fungi have been prised of the mineral components co-evolving for more than 200 of sand , silt and clay , clustered million years , and our scientific with organic matter . When you understanding of these myriad pick up a handful of soil and it relationships is still unfolding . breaks into little pieces , those are
Most of the mycorrhizae remain a vast , invisible , underground soil is oxygenated — without which ,
aggregates . They help ensure that
network . But there is a type that soil organisms cannot survive . forms mutualistic relationships Rainwater infiltrates into soil with tree roots and produces because of passageways created fruiting bodies better known as by plant roots and animal tunnels . mushrooms ! These include delectable edible varieties like chante- soil , destroys aggregates , dis-
Plowing or tilling literally fractures
relles , truffles and porcini , the very rupts the hyphal network , crushes poisonous kinds like death caps , habitat , kills some of the fauna and and the hallucinogenic types like compacts the soil . The compaction psilocybin . And there ’ s archaeo- leads to water running off the land
Living soil from a farm as seen under a microscope . instead of filtering into it . Although more research is needed , a study published in 2022 in PeerJ ( www . ncbi . nlm . nih . gov / pmc / articles / PMC8801175 ) compared nutritional values of crops grown conventionally with those grown on farms that combined no-till , cover crops , and diverse rotations . The latter farms produced crops with higher levels of phytochemicals , vitamins , and minerals , i . e ., more “ nutrient dense ” foods . That ’ s evidence that healthier soil produces food that ’ s healthier for us to eat !
How we care for the land from which we get our sustenance has profound influences on our own health . Wendell Berry , farmer / philosopher / poet said that , “ While we live , our bodies are moving particles of the earth , joined inextricably both to the soil and to the bodies of other living creatures . It is hardly surprising , then , that there should be some profound resemblances between the treatment of our bodies and our treatment of the earth .”
In an interesting and not coincidental parallel , just like living soil , we humans also depend on bacteria and fungi — our gut microbiome and mycobiome — to supply us with essential nutrition . In fact , there is growing scientific interest in the similarities of our guts and the soil . Both contain approximately the same number of active microorganisms , but human gut microbiome diversity is only 10 % that of soil biodiversity in natural systems , having decreased dramatically with modern lifestyles . This also coincides with the increased use of synthetic chemicals and monocropping , that arose after World
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