Posted by hans on August 11, 1998 at 19:05:20:
Heat wave spells trouble for truffles
PARIS (Reuters) - French truffle growers, their precious fungi threatened by a sweltering heat wave, said on Tuesday they needed more subsidies to protect the costly crop.
As temperatures climbed toward 40 Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) in central and southern France for the fourth straight day, the French Federation of Truffle Growers warned that only special underground irrigation systems could guarantee the fungi would not shrivel up.
"The truffle is an underground mushroom that requires water," the federation said in a statement. "Too long a period of dryness could destroy the young truffles just now forming, which normally would grow larger and continue developing in the ground until winter."
While modern irrigation systems have been installed in recent plantations of the particular variety of oak tree that truffles adore, most truffle forests lack the equipment, the federation said.
France currently produces about 50 tons a year of the odoriferous fungi, and additional European Union aid would be needed to keep production growing, it said. Truffles, often referred to as Black Gold for the high prices they fetch, can sell wholesale for up to 1,600 francs per kilo ($125 per pound).