Ethnomycological Study of Wild Edible and Medicinal Mushrooms in District Jammu, J&K, India


 Background: Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) has a rich tradition of usage of wild edible mushrooms (WEM) for culinary and medicinal purposes. But very few studies, restricted to some regions of the Union Territory, have been conducted to enlist the WEM. District Jammu has never been explored for WEM. Moreover, the quantification of the traditional knowledge of WEM has not been carried out as yet in J&K. Therefore, the present study was conducted in Jammu district with aims of; enlisting the WEM and its usage, finding the most used WEM, and enumerating the consensus of usage for a species and associated knowledge. Methods: Data of use reports was collected as per semi–structured questionnaire from 192 randomly selected informants. The cultural importance index (CI) and informant consensus factor (Fic) were calculated on the basis of use reports. Analysis of variance was used to evaluate the significance of differences in the usage of WEM among the different informant categories.Results: Results of the present study show that the locals were having the knowledge of fourteen fleshy fungi that are mainly utilized for culinary purposes. They also affirmed various medicinal values of some of these fungi. Termitomyces sp. (CI, 0.57) was the most important and diversely used species. Termitomyces heimii, Termitomyces clypeatus and Termitomyces striatus var. annulatus were the other frequently consumed species by the locals. More than 78.6% of these WEM were new records as culinary and medicinal for Jammu and Kashmir (UT). Agaricaceae and Lyophyllaceae were the largest families and Termitomyces (5 species) the most represented genera. Females, elders, and informants who have not attended schools were having significantly (P<0.05) higher information regarding WEM. The maximum consensus was recorded for the use of WEM as culinary with 596 citations and 0.98 Fic, and the minimum homogeneity was found for their use in skin diseases (42 citations and 0.76 Fic).Conclusion: The inhabitants of district Jammu had good knowledge of WEM, but no documentation, lying of most of the information with elders and uneducated people, and destruction of forests and other natural habitats of WEM pose serious threat of losing this valuable information in near future. An ardent need is to educate locals regarding regionally available WEM. Further studies are recommended for developing protocols of cultivation of these WEM so that their future availability is ascertained along with creating income resources for the local population.


Introduction
The edible eshy fungus growing in natural habitats and not cultivated is classi ed as wild edible mushroom (WEM). These species are a great source of proteins, bres, minerals, and trace elements [1] apart from having low content of fats, low or negligible calories and cholesterol [2]. In addition to nutritional values, WEM have abundance of bioactive compounds like antibacterial, antidiabetic, anticancer, anticoagulant, antifungal, anti-HIV, antiin ammatory, antioxidant, antiparasitic, antiproliferative, antiviral, cytotoxic, hepatoprotective compounds, hypocholesterolemic, among others [3][4][5]. Due to these nutritional and health bene ts, WEM can be used as an important food to eradicate the menace of malnutrition from various African and Asian countries. FAO is also promoting the use of WEM for income generation and food security [6].
As many as 2000 species of edible fungi have been reported to be in use worldwide [7]. Boa [8] has reported 88 species as edible and medicinal, 249 species as food and medicinal and 133 species as medicinal only fungi i.e. a total of 470 medicinal fungi worldwide. In another estimate by Rai et al. [7] approximately 650 species of fungi have medicinal value. A total of 283 edible fungi have been recorded from India [9], besides 100 medicinal fungi [10]. Despite so many bene ts, the use of WEM is not common in Indian societies due to; (i) incidences of food poisoning after the consumption of toxic fungi, (ii) some religious bindings as WEM are considered non-vegetarian food by some communities, (iii) urbanization and change in land use from forests to agriculture reducing the availability of WEM, and (iv) non-availability of local guide for the identi cation of edible and toxic fungi. The problem of identi cation of edible fungus can be solved by promoting the folk taxonomy of the WEM. Folk taxonomies are the outcome of social knowledge, interactions and dialects. It is the categorization of organisms on the basis of the conventional system of using vernacular names [11][12][13]. Mostly the vernacular names are based on some prominent features such as appearance, colour, habit, habitat, shape, size, smell, taste, utility as edible or poisonous [11,12].
Jammu is the winter capital of Jammu and Kashmir (Union Territory). The topography of most part of the district is undulating. Agriculture is the main occupation of approximately 60% of the population. The percentage of uncultivated and cultivated land area is 22.4% and 35.3%, respectively and the forest cover of district Jammu is merely 12.6% [38]. The forests are highly degraded and fragmented and the villagers usually visit them for the collection of fuelwood and non-wood forest products especially WEM. The present study was executed in district Jammu with aims of; (i) listing the traditional knowledge of wild edible and medicinal mushrooms, (ii) nding the most used WEM, and (iii) enumerating the consensus of usage for a species and associated knowledge. The outcome of this study will help in understanding the status of WEM and associated knowledge in Jammu district. This study can also lay the foundation for further studies on the nutritional aspects of the WEM, and their domestication and popularization to serve humanity, especially farmers and local populace, in generating income along with health bene ts.

Study area
Jammu is situated to the South of the great Himalayan range and North of the plains of Punjab (Fig. 1).
Located at 32.73° N and 74.87° E and covering approximately 3,250 Km 2 area it comprises four tehsils viz. Akhnoor, Bishnah, Jammu, and Ranbir Singh Pura (R.S. Pura). Altitude of the district above sea level varies from 300-800m. The region has great variation in its temperature and precipitation with mean monthly temperature above 20° C. Situated in the subtropical part, the district has a markedly periodic climate as is characterized by a dry and increasingly hot season from April to June, a warm monsoon period from July and September and a dry and cold weather from October to December with slight winter rain during the months of January to March. The overall characteristics of Jammu forests is of dry, mixed deciduous or scrub type and the dominant vegetation of the forests comprises of Acacia modesta, Aegle marmelos, Butea monosperma, Cassia stula, Zizyphus mauritiana, Mallotus phillipensis, Diospyros montana, Grewia optiva, Pinus roxburghii, Premna barbata, Terminalia billerica, Adhatoda vasica, Flacourtia indica, Dodonaea viscosa, Capparis sepiaria, Woodfordia fruticosa.

Methodology
Collection and identi cation of fungi Systematic and periodic surveys of different locations of district Jammu were conducted, and careful eld records were made for habitats, hosts, substrates, and photographs of collection sites and fruit bodies were taken for studying wild eshy fungi. Macroscopic features were studied from fresh material and microscopic structures were observed in dried material by using 5% KOH and Congo Red. Microcharacters were observed with a Nikon E-400 microphotographic unit. Further identi cation and con rmation was done using pertinent keys, monographs and books [39][40][41][42]. Details of various mushroom species were taken from Ainsworth and Bisby's "Dictionary of Fungi" by Hawksworth et al. [43] and Kirk et al. [44]. Online websites like www.mycokey.com, www.mushroomexpert.com were also used for identi cation and related information. All the specimens were submitted to the herbarium of the Department of Botany, University of Jammu, Jammu, J&K, India.

Ethnomycological data collection
The ethnomycological study was carried between February 2014 and October 2018, and September 2020 and September 2021. The preliminary survey was carried out to nd out about the persons who have the knowledge of local mushrooms. As per this detailed discussion and interactions during this survey a total of 423 persons between the age group of 25 and 87 yrs were selected randomly but only 192 inhabitants, having the knowledge of WEM, turned up to be the informants. These 192 informants (87 females and 105 males) were interviewed as per a semi-structured questionnaire. All informants were interviewed at least thrice for the collection of information regarding historical background, edibility status, traditional usage, methods of preservation, commercial importance of eshy fungi, and possible reasons for lower diversity of wild edible fungus in the region. All the interviews and discussions were conducted in different local dialects (Dogri, Hindi and Poonchi). The veri cation of the macrofungal species was done in the months of the rainy season and the informants were requested to escort us during the eld visit to con rm the species and information thereof. The help of identi ed specimens and photographs already with us were also taken.

Data analysis
The data, collected through interviews, on the number of uses cited by the informants was analysed using Cultural importance index (CI) and factor informant consensus (F ic ). Cultural importance index (CI) was calculated as the sum total of use report (UR) for a species in culinary and medicinal use categories divided by number (192) of informants (N), and mathematically expressed as: where, the seven use-categories (u) are u 1&2 and informants (i) are i  . According to Tardio and Pardode-Santayana [36], CI accounts for the spread as well as versatility of uses. They further stated that CI is a better index than other indices because the maximum value of CI is the total number of uses in different use-categories.
To test homogeneity of information and knowledge sharing about the medicinal plants, the factor informant consensus (F ic ) was used [37]. The F ic was calculated as: where, n ur refers to the total number of citations for a particular use category and n t refers to the number of plants used for a particular use category. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) was applied to compare the means of different attributes related to informants like gender, age and education with respect to the collection of WEM and traditional beliefs. Fisher's LSD was applied as a multiple range test to compare the signi cant number of WEM collected by informants when the value of ANOVA was signi cant at P < 0.05.

Informants
Agriculture is the main source of livelihood and earning besides cattle rearing and poultry at small scale. Females help their male counterparts in different agricultural activities like sowing, harvesting and threshing of crops, and storage of grains. They also look after the cattle and along with their children take the livestock to the nearby forests or grazing lands for grazing every morning and generally collect rewood, non-wood forest products and WEM when they return home. The tradition of accompanying children during the collection of non-wood forest products and WEM also transmits vital information about these valuable resources to the next generation. Kumar and Sharma [11] and Bhatia et al. [48] have also reported similar traditions for females and children in other parts of Jammu and Kashmir.
Agaricaceae with 5 genera and 5 species, and Lyophyllaceae with 1 genus and 5 species were the most important families, whereas the other three families were represented by one species each (Fig. 4). The higher use of members of Agaricaceae and Lyophyllaceae is in line with other studies [30,[51][52][53]. Higher percentage of these two families in most of the regional ethnomycology may be to their appealing taste and better income [11,30] and/or easy to identify as edible and de nite locations like termite mounds.
Termitomyces was the largest genera with 5 species (45.5%). The dominance of Termitomyces in the WEM is in accordance with most of the studies conducted in the tropical regions [29,30,50,[53][54][55] .
General perception of the local populace and folk taxonomy As per most of the informants (>73.4%) thundering and lightning are the prime indicators of fruiting of WEM. Most of the elders (88.9%), having more than 50 yrs of age, believe that these natural phenomenons are responsible for bringing up WEM from the lap of mother earth. In the rainy season, they visit the termite mounds, wastelands, grazing lands and nearby forests, if present, after thundering and lightening ( Table 2). Other workers [29,30] have also reported thundering and lightning as an important indicator for mushroom hunting.
Another local perception regarding mushroom hunting is that while collecting wild edible fungus one should be silent to ensure that these mushrooms may appear in the next season at the same place. Kumar and Sharma [11] have reported that in the hilly tracks of Doda and Bhadarwah regions of Jammu and Kashmir, the tribes collect the mushrooms, especially morels, early in the morning.
Local people also broadly classi ed the use of white coloured mushrooms as edible while bright coloured mushrooms are considered poisonous. Some of the elderly informants said that they distinguish the edible fungus by their mild taste. These results are in line with Kumar and Sharma [11], Sagar et al. [16] and Sitotaw et al. [30] who have also reported colour of the mushroom as the prime indicator for identi cation of WEM.
In the present study, most of the local respondents did not come out with a good deal of descriptive vocabulary with respect to morphology, growth, and habit of macrofungi. As represented in table 3, there were some local names which were used for a group of fungi, e.g. agarics were commonly known as 'Chattri', puffballs as 'Khucoon', and earthstars as 'Zameeni Tare'. Among agarics, Termitomyces species were particularly known as 'Khumb', 'Tanna', 'Sootree' or 'Naadu'. However, the knowledge related to the folk nomenclature was scarce and limited in the study area in comparison to the other mycophilic regions of the state like Bhaderwah, Kishtwar and Ladakh where people had developed rich ethnotaxonomic knowledge and experience in the utilization of the wild edible mushroom resources. Kumar and Sharma [11] have thrown light on 37 vernaculars indigenously used for 71 wild mushrooms from Bhadarwah region of Jammu and Kashmir while as Dorjey [13] reported 45 vernaculars used for various mushroom species in three areas of Ladakh. Kour [12] also recorded different vernacular names like 'Zameeni Tare' (Astraeus hygrometricus), 'Santri Chattri' (Leucoagaricus rubrotinctus), 'Sootree' (Termitomyces heimii) from Poonch district.

Cultural importance index (CI)
The highest CI was recorded for Termitomyces sp. (CI = 0.57). Other important edible mushrooms were Termitomyces heimii (CI, 0.48), Termitomyces clypeatus (CI, 0.44) and Termitomyces striatus var. annulatus (CI, 0.39) ( Table 3). Termitomyces spp. has wide acceptability worldwide due to high concentration of proteins, vitamins and minerals [55][56][57][58], lower fat contents and carbohydrates [59] and an important source of income [60]. All these species grow on or around the termite mounds. As per Hindu religion, these termite mounds are sacred places where "Naag Devta" (snake deity) lives and people don't disturb them and offer water and milk, and roat (a traditional chapatti made up of wheat our, jaggery and desi ghee) on every Sunday. Thus, a religious belief provides protection and good nourishment to the fungal mycelium. Calvatia bovista (CI, 0.24), with a very restricted distribution in the study area, was eaten only in the young stages as some of the people were of the opinion that its consumption in later stages could cause gastrointestinal problems since they were prone to insect infestation when extended fully ( Table 2).
All these edible species have some medicinal value (Table 3). Eleven species each were good against skin problems and development of immunity, and eight species for heart ailments. In some other parts of India, Termitomyces heimii is used in treatment for cold, fever, and fungal infections [61] and as blood tonic

Informant consensus factor
The maximum consensus was recorded for the use of eshy fungus as culinary with 596 citations and 0.98 F ic (Table 4), justifying their main utility as food. Similar ndings have also been reported by Sitotaw et al. [30] in the community of district Menge of Ethiopia where WEM were utilized primarily for culinary purposes. The minimum homogeneity was found for immunity development (42 citations and 0.76 F ic ).
The high values of the informant consensus factor indicate greater homogeneity, and also show that informants share whatever knowledge lies with them about WEM [49].

Conclusions
This is the rst-ever study to document the traditional knowledge of wild edible mushrooms (WEM) in district Jammu. Substantial information regarding the usage of wild mushrooms as food and medicine is available with the inhabitants of district Jammu. A total of eleven WEM from 5 families and 7 genera were reported by 50 informants. But there is a great risk of losing this valuable information in near future because females, elders and illiterate persons were having signi cantly higher information about WEM than others and all these sects of a society are the most vulnerable as far as storage and spread of information is concerned. In addition to this, reduction in natural habitats and no written record of WEM may also result in erosion of the traditional knowledge about these valuable treasures of nutrition. Although, accompanying children with mothers is a small ray of hope for maintaining perpetuity of knowledge regarding WEM, still we need to safeguard the natural habitats of mushrooms and popularize them as early as possible. As reported in other tropical regions of the world, Termitomyces was the most dominant genera of the present study. For the betterment of the society and to ful ll the requirements of both income generation and food security we need to focus our research on the domestication and cultivation of Termitomyces spp. A detailed investigation with respect to nutritional as well as medicinal aspects of these species is also required.
Declarations Tables   Table 1 The collection of wild edible mushrooms (WEM) by informants The values given in the table are mean ± SD. Fisher's LSD was applied as multiple-range test when ANOVA was found signi cant at P < 0.05. Similar alphabets in a column for an attribute show that the values do not vary signi cantly. Table 2 The social belief regarding collection of wild edible mushrooms (WEM)     Number of genera and species in various families of eshy fungi