Description
Chaga is one of the most beneficial medicinal fungi in the world. This wood-loving fungus grows on birch trees in cold climates including North America, Canada, Russia, Northern Europe, Alaska and Siberia. Chaga is typically called “chaga mushroom”, but the sclerotia is the part that is used medicinally, usually as a tea.
Chaga looks a bit like chunks of burnt wood or charcoal. This dark mass is known as a conk. Chaga conks might look like a tree tumor, and they are techincally a parasite to the tree, but they are a treasure to herbalists. Chaga is used just like cordyceps, reishi and Lion’s mane. Chaga offers support in the following areas: preventing cancer, lowering blood sugar, lowering cholesterol, reducing inflammation and neutralizing free radicals.
Chaga is rich in polysaccharides. Polysaccharides are a primary group of compounds in most medicinal mushrooms. This group of compounds is correlated with immune response and modulation.
Chaga is a rich storehouse of antioxidants. Chaga has one of the highest ORAC scores, which measures the antioxidant potential of foods. This puts it above turmeric, wild blueberres, blackberries, apples, and acai berries.
Chaga also absorbs Betulin and betulinic acid from the birch bark it grows on. Betulinic acid is a terpene with antiretroviral and antimalarial properties. it is also found in the medicinl herb, prunella vulgaris (selgheal). It is also found in cosmetics because of its antioxidant properites. Betulin is also a terpene. It helps the birch trees survive cold weather such that it is one of the northernmost dioecious trees in the world. That is why you typically find chaga in cold climates.
Chaga cannot be cultivated and must be harvested from the wild. However, some people do innoculate wild birch trees with chaga. Chaga can grow on a variety of hardwoods, but other trees will not give chaga the betulin and betulanic acid. For that reason, you only want chaga grown on living white or yellow birch trees.
We offer large, high-quality, wildcrafted chaga mushroom chunks from living white Birch trees collected in Maine.
