Truffle Resurgens
With the retirement of Alfred Collins Truffle hunting almost died out in England. There were a number of reasons. It was a hand to mouth existence, hard work with very uncertain rewards, hunters often experiencing blank days and poor seasons, especially in years where there were low amounts of rainfall. Falling demand, especially after the First World War, saw prices plummet and dogs which were taxed were expensive to own.
The migration from the countryside to urban settings contributed to the loss of rural skills, exacerbated by deforestation reducing the natural habitats in which the truffles grew. The move away from coppicing in arboriculture meant the development of denser canopies of taller trees, shading out any undergrowth and the woodland floor, led to a reduction in the number of truffles.
While a combination of these factors led to the decline of truffle hunting in the wild, a scientific development in the 1970s pioneering inoculation techniques in France opened the way for truffles to be grown in managed plantations. In a nursery setting the fungus spore is attached to the roots of a tree and allowed to germinate and create a fungus root known as a mycellum to cover the root of a tree. It is then taken to a field and planted.
During the first few years, the health of the tree is monitored, the soil’s acidity carefully controlled, and water supplied through an irrigation to create the conditions necessary to develop a truffle underground. Eventually, in the spring the primordia or small truffles are generated, red on the outside and white inside, widening in the autumn and ripening in the winter.
The first black truffle to be grown in the United States was harvested in Northern California in 1987, while in 2009 Chile became the third southern hemisphere country after New Zealand and Australia to cultivate truffles. It is estimated that there are as many as 1,000 truffle farms outside of Europe.
Truffle growing in the southern hemisphere has a distinct attraction as the harvest season, the colder months of June, July, and August, are precisely the months when they are not available in Europe. Trufas del Nuevo Mundo in Argentina, which grew its first black truffle, weighing 69 grams, in 2016 now has some 20,000 mycorrhizal trees and does a roaring trade supplying European consumers with their favourite fungus.
Truffles are back, it seems.
