As foraging gains ground, ethical issues emerge
A couple on a weekend hike through the Oakland hills pick a few blossoms, some wild onions and fennel.
[...] where is the tipping point between picking a bit of California cuisine and denuding our riparian environments and robbing animals of the food they need?
Jonah Raskin, professor and chair of communications studies at Sonoma State University, explored that in a recent Bay Nature magazine article.
When Raskin moved to Sonoma County, he collected wild blackberries and mussels and learned about mushrooming from some of the older Italian families around Occidental.
Sustainably picked?
Because mushrooms are the fruiting bodies of subterranean fungi, foragers claim they can be sustainably picked.
A long-term study by Simon Egli and his colleagues at the Swiss Federal Research Institute, published in 2006, offered some support for that, finding no decrease in abundance or diversity in picked plots compared with control plots.
Edible seaweed is also subject to over harvesting, according to environmental scientist Renée Pasquinelli, who works on the Mendocino Coast.
Leading field trips for ForageSF, a band of local foraging advocates who also organize monthly Wild Kitchen dinners and Underground Markets, Kevin Feinstein, co-author of "The Bay Area Forager," reinforces sustainable harvesting and respect for private property and park rules.
Foraging is getting more and more popular, and this concerns me when greedy people jump in to make a buck.
When they encounter foragers, rangers use persuasion: They're good at public relations and can often talk people out of their mushrooms.
While there is a permit program for Americans Indians, because foraging wild plants was central to their traditions, park management has not been receptive to overtures from other would-be foragers.
Raskin, who participated with Duerr and Feinstein in a panel discussion on foraging at Mrs. Dalloway's Books in Berkeley in May, says researching the article brought the ethical issues home.