Yellow Knight — Thoughts On Eating A "Deadly" Mushroom

[Music] greetings everyone i'm adam harrington today i'm hanging out in a pine forest and i'm here specifically to look for one wild mushroom now this isn't just any wild mushroom this is a pretty controversial mushroom in many parts of the world and the controversy started back in 2001 when a report was published in the scientific literature linking the consumption of this wild mushroom to 12 poisoning cases and three of those cases ended up a death since that report was published more poisoning cases have been linked to the consumption of this wild mushroom with a few of those cases also ending up in death now i came to this exact spot a week ago specifically to look for this wild mushroom and to harvest it i brought the mushroom home i cooked it and i ate it now i don't really consider myself to be a risk taker especially with my food choices so why in the world would i do something like that come along with me we'll explore this area a bit more in depth and i'll share with you some very important information regarding a beautiful mycorrhizal mushroom known as the yellow knight so here i am in an area dominated by pine trees there's a bunch of red pine trees around me this is red pine right here there's some eastern white pine trees there's virginia pine over there there's a few scots pine there's some spruce trees in here as well and here in eastern north america this is one of the habitats where you will find the yellow knights mushroom and it's not that easy to see the yellow knight right now because it's covered up with all this pine needle litter but it's popping up if you look really closely you will see this yellow mushroom right here just pushing up there's another one right here there's a couple scattered about i have a nice beautiful yellow night specimen right here so in addition to yellow night there are other common names used to describe this mushroom another popular one is man on horseback and the currently accepted latin binomial of the species is tricholoma equestri then some older field guides you will see the name tricholoma flavo virens being used as well now this mushroom has a big distribution it just doesn't grow here in eastern north america it grows all across north america and it grows in many parts of europe so the yellow knight is a medium-sized mushroom that grows in association with conifers typically during the autumn months at least here in the northeastern united states the cap of this mushroom is yellow with a brownish center and when fresh the cap is often visited and wet the stem or stipe of this mushroom is typically whitish yellow there is no ring or partial veil around the stem and there is no sac or vulva at the base of the stem underneath the cap you will see gills that are closely spaced they're yellow often times bright yellow and the gills are attached to the stem by what's referred to in field guides as a notch the spore print of this mushroom is white and there is no strong smell associated with this mushroom so what's going on with a yellow knight why would i eat a mushroom that's been linked to lethal poisonings well prior to the 1990s the yellow knight was almost universally considered to be edible you often read that the yellow night mushroom has been eaten since at least medieval times in europe and in all of my mushroom field guides that were published before the year 2000 the yellow knight mushroom is listed as edible and many of the authors consider this mushroom to be a really good edible mushroom and then something happened in 2001 a report was published in the new england journal of medicine with the title wild mushroom intoxication as a cause of rhabdomyolysis in this paper the authors described 12 poisoning cases that occurred between 1992 and 2000 in france involving people who consumed large quantities of the yellow knight three of the twelve people died now the exact toxins were never isolated or described in that paper but all the people who were intoxicated by this mushroom showed signs of a condition known as rhabdomyolysis which is the breakdown of muscle tissue and the spilling of its contents into the bloodstream more evidence supported these findings when the study's researchers gave extracts of the yellow night mushroom to mice the mice that were given the extracts showed signs of rhabdomyolysis and a few of them died now because no poisoning reports were ever associated with the consumption of this mushroom up until that point that paper certainly caused the stir in mushroom communities around the world where this mushroom had been eaten for centuries but those 12 poisoning cases weren't the only ones ever reported a polish study titled acute poisoning with tricholoma equestria documented four additional cases involving three adults and one child who showed signs of rhabdomyolysis after consuming large portions of the yellow knight over several consecutive meals all the poisonings occurred between 2002 and 2008 and while three of the four people recovered within a few weeks of intoxication a 72 year old man died during his second day of hospitalization and then another study was published and this time the yellow knight was linked to poisonings in lithuania between 2004 and 2013. in this paper the authors reported four separate cases involving adults who showed signs of rhabdomyolysis after consuming large consecutive meals of the yellow knight three of the four people recovered after a few weeks but a 44 year old man died six days after consuming the mushrooms so all those papers documented cases involving human intoxication but while all that was going on researchers were also studying the effects of yellowknight toxicity in mice and i already mentioned that this was part of the study that was published in 2001 but additional studies have shown that yellow night mushrooms when fed to mice as extracts can lead to toxicity manifested by certain elevated biomarkers in the animal's blood streams now it should come as no surprise that as this information became widely available many european countries recommended against the consumption of yellowknight mushrooms and now many websites and newer field guides do consider this mushroom's edibility as being highly questionable yet many people still eat this mushroom today and when i say many people i mean many many people there's even a good chance that some of you watching this video eat this mushroom and aren't worried at all about its purported toxicity now the studies that have been published in the past few decades haven't all supported the theory that the yellowknight mushroom is definitely toxic and should be avoided in the past few years two very important papers have given us a bit of a more optimistic viewpoint regarding the yellowknight's edibility status the first paper published in the journal comprehensive reviews in food science and food safety took a really critical look at all the previous toxicity studies on the yellow knight mushroom and raised several key points that are definitely worth mentioning in this video here are six of them number one none of the mushrooms that were linked to human poisonings were ever positively confirmed molecularly to be tricholoma equestri the true yellow knight as it turns out tricholoma equestria can look very similarly to other yellow trachealoma mushrooms so it's possible that the poisonings over the past few decades were actually caused by other mushrooms and not the yellow knight number two no detailed information regarding the storage preparation or cooking of the mushrooms was reported in the majority of the studies so we don't know if the people undercooked the mushrooms or if they store the mushrooms improperly or if they let them sit around too long before ingesting them all of these conditions can affect the edibility of wild mushrooms number three the results of the studies on mice aren't exactly relevant to humans most of the experiments showing toxicity in animals used doses that no human would ever reasonably ingest and when the doses were lowered to more reasonable levels toxicity was either reduced or not experienced at all it's also worth noting that the elevated biomarkers that the researchers were looking for in the mice could also be elevated when other edible mushrooms including chanterelles and porcini mushrooms were administered to mice number four and this is a really key point almost all of the human poisonings were linked to excessive consumption of tricholoma equestria over the span of many consecutive meals in none of the cases did a person eat a small portion of tricholoma equestria then become ill and show signs of rhabdomyolysis number five the toxins in the yellow knight that are supposedly responsible for causing rhabdomyolysis have never been isolated and number six other edible mushrooms have been shown to induce rhabdomyolysis in humans for example the common button mushroom agaricus bisporus has been linked to human cases of rhabdomyolysis for some reason though very few warnings are associated with this mushroom's consumption additionally edible mushrooms in the boletus genus and lexinum genus have also been associated with rhabdomyolysis so clearly the authors who published their study in comprehensive reviews in food science and food safety did their homework and their conclusion was this based on the available evidence we are of the opinion that tricholoma equestri cannot be considered toxic per se and does not appear to exhibit any greater health threat than other mushroom species which are currently considered as edible to further support their viewpoint the same researchers conducted a clinical trial to see what effect if any the yellow knights would have on healthy humans the researchers fed 300 grams or 10 and a half ounces of molecularly identified yellow night mushrooms that were cooked for 10 minutes in butter to 10 human participants none of the participants showed any alterations in their biochemical profiles nor did anyone experience any adverse events the researchers concluded the findings of this study support the view that tricholoma equestria is edible if consumed in rational amounts by healthy subjects so despite numerous cases of intoxication of rhabdomyolysis a few cases of death and display numerous studies analyzing the toxicity of this mushroom i still came here last week to harvest this mushroom and to eat it and i'm here today to do the same and after watching this video in its entirety and hearing both sides of the story i'm sure at least some of you can understand why i would do such a thing but i'm not here today to encourage you to eat this mushroom that's not the point of this video what i am encouraging you to do however is more research and i'm encouraging you to make informed decisions on everything that you eat take responsibility for everything that you put into your body and take responsibility for the ensuing consequences don't be easily persuaded just because you heard something from a stranger on a strange screen don't be easily persuaded because you were lazy or distracted or you didn't take the time to consciously consider the choices that were in front of you and this doesn't just go for wild mushrooms it goes for everything including most of the junk and garbage sold in grocery stores but because we're on the topic of wild mushrooms understand that just because a wild mushroom is listed as edible doesn't mean it's edible for everyone just because a wild mushroom is listed as medicinal doesn't mean it's medicinal for everyone just because the mushroom is listed as poisonous doesn't mean it'll kill everyone when it comes to the yellow knight tricholoma equestri here's what i consider this mushroom has been eaten for centuries this mushroom continues to be eaten by many people in many parts of the world and people rave about its taste and texture however this mushroom has been linked to poisonings some of the associated poisonings have resulted in death but poisonings are almost always attributed to excessive consumption of this mushroom as part of consecutive meals limited consumption of the yellow knight in small amounts is considered by some researchers to be safe no poisoning reports linked to the consumption of the yellow knights have ever been reported in north america [Music] thanks so much for watching this video i truly appreciate it if you want to support this channel there's a few ways to do that you can subscribe to the learn your land youtube channel you can also head on over to learnyourland.com and sign up for the email newsletter and if you're on social media you can give learn your land a follow on instagram and facebook thanks again for watching this video i truly appreciate it and i'll see you on the next one [Music]

Channel: Learn Your Land

Views: 31,812

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Id: YI-prcQA0Ow

Length: 13min 55sec (835 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 10 2020