1870s: Taranaki Wool
May 6, 2019
By AHNZ
Did you know Jew’s Ear mushrooms are/were also known as Taranaki wool?
“Fungus exceeded butter in annual export value five times between 1874 and 1881”- Te Aara
“There is an abundance of it, and as fast as one crop is taken from a log a new one starts; so that there seems to be no reasonable limit to the business which may grow out of it.”- The boy travellers in Australasia, 1888
New Zealand exported these to China, the industry being started up by a Chinese New Zealander Chew Chong, but becoming a very valuable basic domestic occupation for women and children while their families were establishing farms.
In China they were valued as food in their own right but probably used to add texture to existing food and considered medicine.
Not just in Taranaki either. This sample (right) was displayed at Puhoi Museum.
Curious to know what killed the New Zealand fungus industry. Deforestation? WW1 and WW2 smegging up the trade lines?
—
See also
Chinese Whitebait Exports
Like Comment Share
