When I originally wrote this post I never imagined that Chaga would become trendy. PLEASE - there are many good medicinal mushrooms out there that, unlike Chaga, are easily grown for use. Chaga's natural life has very limited parameters which put it at risk for overharvesting. Use Chaga mindfully and specifically, and please use commercially-grown medicinal mushrooms whenever possible. --Margarat, Nov 17, 2013.Medicinal mushrooms are a topic of interest to me as I continue herb studies and keeping Vida's cancer at bay.
We usually think of Asian mushrooms as the medicinal ones, but I think this is just because our culture has become "denatured" and we just don't know what's in our own backyard.
"Backyard" can vary, of course. Chaga mushrooms grow on Birch trees, which definitely aren't part of my Southern California backyard (natural habitat). Birch trees are part of my New Hampshire habitat.
The ground Chaga that I used today was purchased from Woodland Essence, which harvests from their area in New York. (They have a nice little info page on Chaga, which is also the source of the above photo).
I decocted the Chaga for 20 minutes (that means starting with cold water, bringing to a boil, and them simmering covered), using 1 tablespoon Chaga for a cup of water. Decoction is recommended by Christopher Hobbs in his book on Medicinal Mushrooms, as the best way to get the full medicinal effects (based on chemical studies), even though the bag it came in only suggested infusing for 5-10 minutes.
The result looked like coffee (grounds and all) - here's a teaspoonful (strained) on a saucer:
It tastes bitter, like coffee, but it has no lingering aftertaste. While my mom thought it tasted "like biting into a tree," Vida didn't seem to care at all lapping it up.I'm beginning to suspect that bitter/dirt tastes are inconsequential to dogs. Either that or the trust you when they see you take a sip first.
There isn't really information about how much of this one should consume every day, except to say that overdoing it doesn't seem to come up at all. Dogs certainly don't have the luxury of a dosage guide, so it seems to me that a sensible dose would be a tablespoon for a medium dog.
Most of the studies on Chaga come from Russia and other nearby areas - obviously because of the birch forests of the region where one would find Chaga.
It's got anti-tumor properties, and has shown to be especially helpful for cancers of the digestive system, as well as digestive issues related to cancer treatments. It's of course an immune booster, and helps balance the endocrine system and blood sugar, and has some anti-inflammatory properties as well.
The taste and feel of it to me seems very slightly astringent, not drying the mouth, but cleansing it. I choose to interpret this as Phlegm Resolving, Bitter, and Neutral.
While the polysaccharides are the primary immune boosters, it's thought that the strongest anti-tumor properties are due to the fact that Chaga feeds off Birch trees, absorbing specific chemicals that may be the core chemicals for attacking tumors.
Wouldn't it be something if Vida's little lipoma got littler? That would be a nice visible success to be able to point to.
All-in-all this sounds like a great drink not only for Vida, but for me! Finally, I'm gonna do something for myself too (besides just the liver tonic tea we've been taking together).
I'd love to hear from anyone about their experiences or knowledge about Chaga, or their questions about my opinions here.
8 comments:
I'll be following this with interest - great information!
I'm happy to find this post as I just started Chaga tea three days ago. I also bought it from Woodland Essence. What I do is place one Tablespoon of the tea into 12 oz. of cold water. I use 12 oz. to allow for the slight evaporation you get when you boil it briefly. I then bring it to a boil, allow that to continue for about 5 minutes and then turn it off and cover it, steeping for 15-20 minutes. I strain the tea, save the grounds and, since you can re-use the grounds once again without losing any of the medicinal qualities, I immediately add another 12 oz. of water to the strained grounds and let that sit for several hours before I bring it to a boil, repeating the process above and then drink that tea. The second cup is far stronger due to the soaking of the bark/mushroom.
In listening to herbalist Daniel Vitalis, he has been using Chaga as a base for many of his "herbal elixers" in tea form. This intrigued me as Chaga seems to be a nice "foundation" (starter) for whatever you want to build on top of it. Woodland Essence even suggests blending it with Dandelion root for liver cleansing. (I know you have to really boil dandelion root to get the most out of it and so I'd add the separate boiled decoction of dandelion root to the Chaga as I just don't want to boil the Chaga that much.) Anyway, getting back to using it as a base, I've been experimenting today with adding one Tablespoon of Reishi powder and one Tablespoon of Cordyceps powder to the cup of Chaga. THIS IS KIND OF HARD TO DRINK BUT WHAT A PUNCH IT PACKS! This triad of mushrooms intuitively seems to be a dynamic threesome that really covers everything from fatigue, immunity, liver cleansing, blood cleansing, tumors, cancer, sexual enhancing, antioxidant, and SO much more.
I purchased my Cordyceps and Reishi from www.mushroomharvest.com. They also have Chaga which is a STRONG beta-glucan extract powder made with a combo of the wild harvested fungus and a carefully monitored extract made in their facility. The supreme beta-glucan content of the Chaga from Mushroomharvest is something to consider if you are exclusively using the Chaga for cancer. No, I'm not affiliated with them in any way. I just know a lot about beta-glucan and how it works for cancer.
I'll follow this thread as I really want to hear other people's experiences with Chaga.
My dog Arrow has "valley fever" (coccidiomycossis) a nasty fungal disease that attacks the lungs 1st and then can eat away at the bone. Arrow's had progressed to the later stage before the 7th vet we'd seen caught it with digital x-rays. We have been treating it with fluconazole for almost 2 years. This is a nasty drug that I have been supporting with liver cleansing and immune boosting herbs. His vitality almost instantly changed upon the use of the fluconazole (which only stops the growth of the fungus, his immune system has to kill it) and herbal treatment. Although his titer wasn't dropping. I started a new powdered herbal blend and added chaga as well as pau d' arco in with my milk thistle, astragalus, siberian ginseng(eluthero), tumeric, and oatstraw. In a 1 1/2 yrs his titer stayed at 64, we want it at 0. His other systems however were still very healthy and blood count was completely normal otherwise, somewhat surprising to docs. So 3 months after I started my new formula I got another blood test the titer had dropped to 15!, 3 months later we went in again and it had dropped somewhere between 1-4. I give him all the herbs powdered (1/2 tsp) and pau d' arco glycerite tincture on his food 2x a day and none on the weekends. Lots of the herbs I was giving arrow before work on a deep level and take time to work, but I feel it is undeniable that the sudden drop was due to the chaga and pau d' arco. I also for myself like to powder the chaga and mix it with honey to a thick cookie dough consistancy, this is awesome for any herbs or dried mushrooms.
Thanks so much (anonymous? darn!) for sharing this. I truly appreciate hearing from folks using these methods successfully with their pets.
Did you decide to feed the chaga dry (rather than doing a water extraction) simply for ease of use, or have you found research on that?
I ask because I have been asked about the most efficacious preparation for medicinal use - whether feeding ground up dried mushrooms is effective enough, whether alcohol extractions are effective, or whether you should stick to the traditional water extraction.
Herbalists I speak to pretty much recommend traditional water extraction.
I feel that the trouble is that medicinal mushroom products are hitting the market in a big way, and of course companies will promote theirs as the best. Most of the research, however, predates these products.
Thanks so much for adding to our knowledge, all your details are useful.
Water extractions are probably the oldest way of doing it, ("all that the rain promises and more", a wonderful mushroom field guide by David Arora, describes in detail how it is done tradtionally in Russia) I don't have research on what's best.....but generally what dictates the best way to take something is what the active chemical is soluble in. Eating roots or powdered herbs is a sure bet you are getting whatever that chemical is, (since it is basically the "whole" plant or fungi still, while in extractions the actual plant is strained out) Although something to always keep in mind as well is the smaller the medicine is broken up the quicker it will extract, and the body will be able to absorb it easier and more efficiently.
Cordyceps Sinensis is something I recommend you to check.
How did chaga perform on the lipomas? Thanks.
Hi "Unknown", sorry for taking so long to comment, it seems I wasn't getting notifications of comments awaiting moderation.
It turns out that what I thought was a lipoma was actually a nerve sheath tumor.
http://theartofdog.blogspot.com/2010/09/its-called-nerve-sheath-tumor.html
We removed it surgically as it had gotten quite large. Later, as she developed more of them, we discovered that Beta-Thym reduced them all to nothing.
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