CANACONA: Mushrooms selling like hotcake all over Goan towns with a premium rate of upwards of Rs 500 for a packet of 25 mushrooms, saw a slump in rate in Canacona this week.
Button mushrooms, a delicacy affordable to the affluent people in the society which grow wild in the forests of Goa mostly on termite hills, where the soil, moisture and humid conditions are conducive for their growth.
The first flush of mushrooms comes mostly in mid July in the northern forest belts of Goa and commands a rate which is beyond the reach of common man.
However, the later flushes of this wild mushrooms comes in first and second week of August coinciding with the festival of Nagpanchami when the rates ease out to a great extent.
It requires trips to the forests at regular intervals in search of wild mushrooms and people are reportedly leaving their houses as early as 5 in the morning to be the first one to locate and harvest the mushrooms, once located on the termite mounds the picker has to brush the mushroom with a small branch of jungle plant called iske jhad (local name) possibly to scare away any snakes present at the spot.
Once harvested, the mushrooms are packed and folded in big leaves of either karmal or teak tree, and mostly sold in towns and on the national highway which is a common site between Balli and Canacona. Due to limited supply and high demand for this edible fungi the rates normally sky rocket up to Rs 1000 in the beginning of the season, but due to slump in overall business in the taluka of Canacona a packet of 25 buds of midsized mushrooms were selling as low as Rs 150.
