FermenteaWhere food goes to change
Other
Cyttaria gunnii is a fungus that forms galls on southern beech in Tasmania and Victoria. Aboriginal Australians ate its fleshy fruiting bodies, and modern sources disagree on its safety.
Cyttaria gunnii is an obligate parasite of southern beech (Nothofagus), forming yellow to orange fruiting structures that look like golf balls. In Australia it grows on Nothofagus in Tasmania and southern Victoria.
The Australian National Botanic Gardens records Aboriginal use of the fleshy fruiting bodies as food. Sources describe the jelly-like fruit as pleasant-tasting, and the liquid inside is the part most often described as eaten. Tasmanian First Nations bush-food accounts include it. An 1833 European account is cited in secondary sources; it was not checked against a primary text for this page.
A molecular study found that the Australian and New Zealand populations are two distinct species, and the Australian ones occur only on Nothofagus cunninghamii. Australian food use should not be assigned to New Zealand Cyttaria species. The catalogue marks the record as historical and in need of modern verification.
The sources disagree on safety. One Wikipedia-derived source treats the species as edible; a New Zealand source calls it technically edible but rarely gathered; and a Tasmanian foraging article calls it poisonous while describing the fruit as delicious. Some foragers advise against eating it without expert confirmation of identity. This page does not give an edibility verdict.
Aboriginal food use recorded in Tasmania; Victoria is also named as part of its range.
Laetiporus portentosus is a wood-decaying bracket fungus recorded in a historical Tasmanian account as a possible emergency food. The identification in that account is probable, not confirmed, so the species is not a confirmed food.
No community contributions have been published for this entry yet.
Sign in to contribute. Published comments and photos are free to read.
Australian National Botanic GardensHistory · Food use
Aboriginal use of fungiAboriginal Australians used the fruit bodies as food.
Cited in: Overview; Traditional food use; Safety
WikipediaTaxonomy · Habitat
Cyttaria gunniiParasite of southern beech in Tasmania and southern Victoria; Australian and New Zealand populations treated as separate species.
Cited in: Overview; Traditional food use; Taxonomy and regional caution; Safety