Cultivation - Growing Truffles in Australia

Truffles are one of the most expensive fungi on the face of the planet. Therefore it is becoming increasingly popular for individuals to start cultivating and growing truffles themselves.

If you are interested in learning how to grow truffles in Australia, email us.

The History of Growing Truffles

Truffles long eluded techniques of domestication, as Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin (1825) noted with his characteristic skepticism:

"The most learned men have sought to ascertain the secret and fancied they discovered the seed. Their promises, however, were vain, and no planting was ever followed by a harvest. This perhaps is all right, for as one of the great values of truffles is their dearness, perhaps they would be less highly esteemed if they were cheaper."

"Rejoice, my friend," said I, "a superb lace is about to be manufactured at a very low price."

"Ah!" replied she, "think you, if it be cheap, that anyone would wear it?"

How to Grow Truffles - Later Developments

However, contrary to stubborn legends, growing truffles is possible. As early as 1808, there were successful attempts to cultivate truffles, known in French as trufficulture. People had long observed that truffles were growing among the roots of certain trees. In 1808, Joseph Talon, from Apt (département of Vaucluse) in southern France, had the idea of how to grow truffles - to sow some acorns collected at the foot of oak trees known to host truffles in their root system.

The growing truffles experiment was successful: years later, truffles were found in the soil around the newly grown oak trees. In 1847, Auguste Rousseau of Carpentras (in Vaucluse) used this method of how to grow truffles and planted 7 hectares (17 acres) of oak trees (again from acorns found on the soil around truffle-producing oak trees). He subsequently obtained large harvests of truffles. He received a prize at the 1855 World's Fair in Paris.

Growing Truffles in the Late 19th Century

These successful truffle growing attempts were met with enthusiasm in southern France, which possessed the sweet limestone soils and dry hot weather that truffles need to grow. In the late 19th century, a dramatic epidemic of phylloxera (an insect) destroyed much of the vineyards in southern France. Another epidemic destroyed most of the silkworms in southern France, making the fields of mulberry trees useless. Thus, large tracts of land were set free for growing truffles. Thousands of truffle-producing trees were planted, and production reached peaks of hundreds of tonnes at the end of the 19th century. In 1890 there were 750 km² (185,000 acres) of truffle-producing trees.

How to Grow Truffles - the 20th Century

In the 20th century, however, with the growing industrialisation of France and the subsequent rural exodus, many of these truffle fields (champs truffiers or truffières) returned to wilderness. The First World War also dealt a serious blow to the French countryside, killing 20% or more of the male working force. As a consequence, newly acquired techniques of trufficulture were lost. Also, between the two world wars, the truffle fields planted in the 19th century stopped being productive. (The average life cycle of a truffle-producing tree is 30 years.) Consequently, after 1945 the production of truffles plummeted, and the prices have skyrocketed. In 1900 truffles were used by most people, and on many occasions. Nowadays, they are a rare delicacy reserved for the rich, or used only for special occasions.

How to Grow Truffles in Australia - Developments in the Last 30 Years

In the last 30 years, new attempts for mass production of truffles have been started. 80% of the truffles now produced in France come from specially planted truffle-fields. Nonetheless, production has yet to recover its 1900s peaks. Local farmers are opposed to a return of mass production, which would decrease the price of truffles. It is estimated that the world market could absorb 50 times more truffles than France currently produces. There are now truffle-growing areas in Spain, Sweden, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, Oregon, North Carolina, Tennessee and the UK.

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