While digging up my spuds I found these unfamiliar fungal-smelling things under an apple tree that overhangs my raised bed. They look like truffles – but having never seen truffles in the flesh, I’m puzzled. John, Co Donegal
Amazing! I confess that I’d no idea that truffles grew in the wild in Ireland until I saw your photo. Wondering if my eyes were deceiving me, I sent it to Dr Una Fitzpatrick, chief scientific officer with the National Biodiversity Data Centre, who, after consulting with a fungi expert, confirmed that these are indeed wild truffles. Unfortunately, it’s not possible to identify the exact species without examining them carefully under a microscope.
Some, but crucially not all, species of truffles are edible and are considered a great culinary delicacy. The edible kinds can command very high prices, with just a single white truffle (Tuber magnatum) selling for many thousands of euro.
Truffles are typically found growing in the ground very close to the root systems of certain species of trees such as oak, hazel, cherry and apple, with which these fungi have a symbiotic relationship. In Europe, they’re most common in parts of France, Italy and Spain.
RM Block
Famously hard to locate in the wild, truffle hunters traditionally enlisted the help of scent-trained dogs or sometimes pigs, both of which have a very keen sense of smell, to find them. Squirrels are also adept at locating them. Signs of their foraging include lots of small holes excavated around the root systems of host trees.
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For centuries horticulturists sought in vain for a way to establish truffle orchards as a way of growing these famously delicious fungi commercially. But it was only in the very late 18th century that the crucial relationship between truffles and their host trees’ root systems as well as the truffles’ need for a free-draining, shallow, lime-rich soil began to be properly understood. As a result, it’s now possible to buy young trees whose root systems have been inoculated with truffle fungi, although it will usually take six to seven years before they start to become productive.
In recent decades several truffle orchards have been successfully established here in Ireland, although for obvious reasons their exact location is a closely guarded secret. With climate change and periods of prolonged drought adversely affecting truffle crops in those parts of southern Europe where they traditionally grew, it’s believed that commercial truffle production increasingly has the potential to become a viable industry in this country (see plantationsystems.com).
