Biotechnology and Cultivation of Desert Truffles
This chapter focuses on showing the biotechnological methods on fungal inoculum and mycorrhizal plant production, developed to cultivate, for the first time, some species of the Terfezia genus. The mycorrhizal synthesis between desert truffles and the Hel
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Introduction
Among the ascomyces truffles, there are several genera with an excellent record as edible fungi, and two of these are of considerable economic importance: Terfezia and Tuber. Of these two genera, only Tuber had been cultivated commercially (for decades), until now. More recently, biotechnological methods on fungal inoculum and mycorrhizal plant production, as well as plantation management, have been developed to cultivate, for the first time, some species of the Terfezia genus (Honrubia et al. 2001, 2005; Morte et al. 2004, 2006). These procedures are presented in this chapter. Here, we attempt to evaluate conclusions on the basis of recent truffle production data from the first field plantations. The genus Terfezia belongs to the so-called “desert truffles” which are a complex family of mycorrhizal hypogeous fungi, mainly containing species of the genera Terfezia, Picoa, Tirmania and Tuber. Their geographical distribution is limited to arid and semiarid lands, mostly in countries around the Mediterranean basin, such as: southern Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, Hungary, Turkey, from Morocco to Egypt, Israel, the Arabian Peninsula, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, and Kuwait. In addition, some desert truffle species have been found in South Africa (Botswana) (Marasas and Trappe 1973), in North America and Japan (Trappe and Sundberg 1977), and China (Wang, unpublished data). Generally, the regions where desert truffles grow have an annual rainfall which ranges from 50 to 380 mm. The truffle season produces good yields if the rainfall ranges from 70 to 120 mm in North African countries and from 100 to 350 mm in countries of southern Europe. The rainfall distribution is very important as far as both quantity and the time of the rainfall are concerned; that is, no later than the beginning of December in North African and Middle Eastern countries and no later than the beginning of October in countries of southern Europe.
A. Morte Dpto. Biología Vegetal (Botánica), Facultad de Biología, Universidad de Murcia, Campus de Espinardo, 30100 Murcia, Spain e-mail: [email protected]
A. Varma (ed.) Mycorrhiza, © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2008
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Desert truffles are of considerable interest for ecological reasons because of the low water input required for cultivation, which makes them an alternative agricultural crop in arid and semiarid areas, and one of commercial interest because of the prices they fetch in the open market. Part of the mystique of truffles is, of course, their often extravagant cost. Desert truffles are cousins of the white fragrant Italian (Tuber magnatum) and Perigord (Tuber nigrum) truffles. However, the prices of the desert truffles are much lower than those of these Tuber species. One of the reasons is that desert truffles are not as strongly flavored as the Tuber species. It is probably a question of good marketing and presenting them in an attractive, glamorous way to people. As desert truffles grow much more prolifically than Tuber species in general, they can be u
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