Let this sink in
Forests & fungi can help resolve the climate crisis, if we let them.
2-3 minute read
TLDR: Natural systems have an amazing ability to deal with sinking CO2 but industrial agriculture is spoiling the show.
Credit Mike Marrah
How did we get here?
Today’s climate crisis began in the mid-1700s with the industrial revolution, since which we’ve been relentlessly pumping out pollution.
Back then, carbon dioxide (CO2) levels were around 280 parts per million (ppm). Recently we’ve surpassed 400 ppm [1].
Finding a way out means managing the causes of CO2 and knowing how to sink the carbon – in other words, sequester it from the atmosphere.
For the skeptics: widely accepted proof shows that CO2 is a heat-trapping gas that warms the earth and changes climate. Higher concentrations of atmospheric CO2 make the planet warmer.
Credit Geran de Klerk
Forest & fungi to the rescue
Interestingly, soil stores more carbon than the atmosphere and vegetation together, and this ability is considered a possible solution in our plight. Soil storage will be a major factor in our future carbon cycle [2].
That said, forests are critical in the carbon sink equation as they are estimated to absorb a third of our CO2 emissions. When trees photosynthesize, they gobble up CO2 and change it into biomass, which gets locked in tree trunks and forest soils.
Not to be outdone, fungi have been discovered as the main pathway in which carbon enters the soil [3].
Fungi mycelium, the fibrous part of a mushroom that grows mostly out of sight, stores carbon in its own biomass. It also expels decomposed carbon into the soil, where it can stay for centuries.
So, fungi are incredible. What’s the rub?
While fungi are rightfully credited as climate warriors, they are fragile. This is a warning alert: fungi mycelium systems are susceptible to nitrogen fertilizers. Put another way: our future survival on earth is endangered by fertilizers.
Chemical fertilizer is a pollutant because it “is causing forests to lose these fungal carbon guardians, amplifying … CO2 emissions and accelerating climate change” [4].
Credit Tholaal Mohamed
Once again we see that industrial agriculture is exacerbating climate change.
In this case, farmers spray crops with fertilizer that blows over to forests and nearby ecosystems and leak into oceans causing algae blooms that devastate ocean life.
Not only are harmful fertilizers on the food you eat, but they sabotage efforts to flatten the carbon curve.
Researchers say that even small changes to fungal communities present a big problem.
A team led by Colin Averill and Jennifer Bhatnagar of Boston University [5] overlaid maps of nitrogen used near forests in the United States.
They found that forests exposed to high levels of nitrogen pollution have far fewer trees with helpful mycorrhizal fungi. According to their research, the impact of nitrogen fertilizers is detectable at a continental scale.
The bottom line
Fungi will happily clean up our mess, but we have to stop killing them off. Fertilizers clearly threaten fungi and carbon sinks such as forests, compounding the impact of forest razing.
Credit Tim Riesner
You preserve your own life by:
Supporting and promoting forest initiatives like American Forests and 1Trillion Trees,
Avoiding chemical fertilizer if you have a garden,
Nourishing your green space with mycelium bombs,
Covering bare soil to aid carbon sequestration (left uncovered, soil becomes barren),
Choosing organic food because no fertilizer is used. Even better, growing your own - it’s easier than you think,
Remembering to reduce, reuse and recycle.
These are just a few ideas. We suggest starting with simple things that are easy to do. Let’s ditch fertilizer, build and support living soil. In doing so, help strengthen humanity’s future prospects and feel great as we go about it.
This is it
Moksha
Sources
Carbon Sequestration and the Significance of Soil Fungi in the Process. Mehar S.K., Sundaramoorthy S. In: Fungi and their Role in Sustainable Development: Current Perspectives. Gehlot P., Singh J. (eds). 2018. Springer, Singapore.
Mycorrhiza-mediated competition between plants and decomposers drives soil carbon storage. Averill C, Turner BL, and Finzi AC. 2014. Nature.
Mycorrhizal hyphal turnover as a dominant process for carbon input into soil organic matter. Godbold DL et al. 2006. Springer.
4 Things to Know About Fungi ‘Climate Warriors’. Boston University. 2018. Futurity.
Continental-scale nitrogen pollution is shifting forest mycorrhizal associations and soil carbon stocks. Colin Averill, Michael C. Dietze, Jennifer M. Bhatnagar. July 2018. Global Change Biology.