Fungi farms to remediate carbon sequestering, could it be possible?

[Frankster]

I was stoned as fuck over at a friends house today, and had an epiphany! Backstory: I've got a plot of land in the mountains next to a landslide zone from a few years back, and last year I had about 1/2 acre of land fall off my lower end, into the slide zone, (approx: 1000 dump truck full) Some big timbers fell as well. Where the spring melt channels during the spring melt, it's essentially a small underground aquifer/slide area that runs part time of the year. I've also got a big full time creek that runs though the center of the property all year long, running nearly 900 feet downhill about 1/4 mile run.


This was my epiphany! I could not only use my fungi mixtures to stabilize some fall zones on my property, and increase the fungal diversity and thickness, but it would also help the plants grow two or three times faster, and speed the recovery of the landslide zone. It's a rain forest area, so the fungi will grow fast, and spread though the area's that need repair.

What I've found on the subject: I wouldn't mind turning this place into a fungal paradise....

The role of mycorrhizal fungi in preventing landslides

An interesting short article points out that mycorrhizal fungi may play a key in reducing the susceptibility to landslides

blogs.agu.org

Species Abundance of Fungi is Greater in Landslide Areas Compared to Undisturbed Areas of the Forest in Monteverde, Puntarenas, Costa Rica

Author(s): Lopez, Sunshine | Abstract: Fungi plays an important role in the ecosystem by decomposing dead plants, and otherorganic matter. Without this process, there would be an accumulation of organic material in theforest which would go un-decomposed. Fungi, which are saprotrophic macrofungi...

escholarship.org

Fungi make steep slopes more stable

Fungi are fantastic. They give us beer, bread and cheese. And if those delicious reasons aren’t sufficient, then here’s another: a new study suggests some fungi can help prevent shallow landslides and surface erosion.

blogs.agu.org

But now I'm reading that they can also sequester carbon at far higher rates than forest....

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nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

Shouldn't industrial fungi farming be able to prevent the entire eco-system from collapse? and are beneficials the redundancy built into the eco-system in balance with more primitive, toxic and deadly forms of pathological and parasitic fungi?

Seems like it's some sort of redundancy built into the ecosystem, if say the earth becomes more "acidic"..
Mycorrhiza Kingdom to the rescue!

 

[Frankster]

Fuck! even shit like benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylenes can be remediated by these types of methods. No doubt, this is a fundamental ecological system in place that regulate the entire plant biome into homeostasis. It's a natural ecological redundancy, if the biome can't diversify or can't flourish, then it resorts to a more primitive state of evolution.

BTEX degradation by fungi


My guess is that this process is going on far underground, in the oil and gas producing regions of the world, under the crust, but the process isn't very well understood. Massive underground fungi reservoirs seem almost probable.

BTEX degradation by fungi - PubMed

Aromatic hydrocarbons such as benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylenes (BTEX) are environmental pollutants that cause serious problems in groundwater, in surface water and in soil. Specifically, the coastal area of Bourgas bay (Bulgarian Black Sea coast) is very vulnerable to such pollution as...

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

 

[Frankster]

It is believed that the development of the arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis played a crucial role in the initial colonisation of land by plants and in the evolution of the vascular plants. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arbuscular_mycorrhiza

Understanding the glue-like protein glomalin to soil structure. This knowledge is applicable to human endeavors of ecosystem management, ecosystem restoration, and agriculture, originated at least 460 million years ago.

Not to be confused with:
Ectomycorrhiza
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ectomycorrhiza
or
Eriocoid mycorrhiza

Ericoid mycorrhiza - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[mysticepipedon]

Adding myco couldn't hurt, but you've got a 68% slope. If it was forested with the soil interlaced with tree roots, I don't think myco would have stopped it.

 

[Snaggleroots]

If you can control the capture and flow,then redirect and minamize soil capacity?
You can control the erosive nature of the slide area.
I like terrace farming.It is a lot of work but once in you can really use a slope to your advantage.
Mycelium will help but isn't the only part to the solution.

 

[Frankster]

Adding myco couldn't hurt, but you've got a 68% slope. If it was forested with the soil interlaced with tree roots, I don't think myco would have stopped it.

The problem out there is the underlying clay, buried beneath 7-13 foot of very light and highly drainable soil, that's been growing on it since the glaciers melted there 10,000 years ago. Below is what happens where those two eco-systems intersect. It's a very delicate eco-system. When the drainable soil soaks in the constant rain water, it produces springs that crawl along the clay base, and work their way downwards, it's a constant battle of erosion, that's playing out.

The top of my property to the bottom is a 900 foot elevation fall, over the distance of about 1/8th of a mile. That's a pretty substantial amount of gravity at work.

When a 200 foot, 12-15 foot round old growth red cedar, douglass fir, or western hemlock falls on my land, it leaves a root base sticking 15 feet in the air, and a 30 foot wide pit, 4-6 foot deep, even deeper in the center, and it ALWAYS falls eastward, (were talking a single tree that would fill 2-3 semi trucks full of wood) because they only fall in the wintertime, when they've got frozen rain/snow on them and the wind is blowing...


Sometimes, the springs are running right though the center of a tree... Up on the mountain...
This is an area that's got a bunch of mid sized hardwood maples, and conifers mixed in along the edges.

 

[Frankster]

If you can control the capture and flow,then redirect and minamize soil capacity?
You can control the erosive nature of the slide area.
I like terrace farming.It is a lot of work but once in you can really use a slope to your advantage.
Mycelium will help but isn't the only part to the solution.

Bing0! Since this area has esentially all fallen in on itself now, and the spring that goes down that part every year collapsed upon itself, the water will find it's way again. If the myco can be build up on that new soil, where the clay got mixed into it, and a new solid base becomes established, with more ecologically appropriate plants, it should hold itself really well. That's the key, using the timing to get the appropriate plants in there, right at the optimum time, to take advantage, and exploit the open ground. It should also help keep that whole zone moist year long.

The area's in the video is above the zone, where the fall has occurred, and that creek running though that tree caused the fall in the early springtime melt-off, and yes certainly a lot of work to get this stuff done right, but the upside to doing it right, seems worthwhile. That's going to be a really, really fertile area.

Personally, I think it can be tamed, to a certain level, but not entirely. When you see that water coming down the waterfall every year, you simply realize the awesome power of that place.

That's sitting 75 yards from the land.

 

[Homesteader]

Beautiful place. I used to work in the civilian youth conservation corp and did a lot of work repairing river erosion. Look into using cedar tree revetments with duckbill anchors. The CCC did a lot of work on the topic, ill see if i can find any info. Sounds like you would need to terrace the slope

 

[Farmer88]

I hope you are independently wealthy. This idea sounds good in theory, but in reality will require massive inputs in structural bracing of the cliff side to allow plants to reestablish intertwined root systems capable of holding the earth on its own durring spring runoff.

Planting trees and scheduled forestry maintenance will be required to rebuild the root zone to prevent errosion.

The reason why people are not fungi farming for errosion purposes is because it's not profitable and is a job best left to army corp of engineers or someone with deep pockets.

 

[Frankster]

I hope you are independently wealthy. This idea sounds good in theory, but in reality will require massive inputs in structural bracing of the cliff side to allow plants to reestablish intertwined root systems capable of holding the earth on its own durring spring runoff.

Planting trees and scheduled forestry maintenance will be required to rebuild the root zone to prevent errosion.

The reason why people are not fungi farming for errosion purposes is because it's not profitable and is a job best left to army corp of engineers or someone with deep pockets.

Not, but thinking about turning it into a foundation non-profit and see if I can find other like minded individuals, I think the ancient glacial terraces above are well worth preserving.


As for the active stream part, I've got a full year stream running though the canyon, down to the base of that waterfall, it's the last creek before that giant falls. The cliff's on the high side of the property seem very stable, and have excellent tree canopy intact on the upper 5 acres or so.

The place that's got the fall zone, in the disaster zone, is mostly a seasonal creek, and under ground streams, so I'm thinking fungi and lot's of ground cover will help with some stability in that area. The engineering statement say's the preferred method is to bring in a bunch of stone, and place more weight on the lower sections, to keep the land from moving.

 

[Farmer88]

The non profit would be the way to go. You will still need a relatively steep budget to get competent people to fulfill the project along with some kind of documentation over several years by some qualified nerd to help make proof of concept in order to maintain constant flow of donation and grant money to fund the project. It seems like a noble concept though it seems likely it will struggle to secure the financial resources needed to function.