Thea Chesney is a lifelong Sierra Nevada foothill resident and naturalist. She has had an interest in mushrooms (and plants, and the rest of the natural world) since early childhood, which gradually became an obsession. She holds a B.S. in forestry from UC Berkeley, with an emphasis in botany and natural sciences. During her time at Berkeley, she spent plenty of time working and hanging out in the Berkeley mycology labs and continues to return to campus to provide specimens for and aid in teaching their mushroom ID course. She worked on a mushroom survey crew for the U.S. Forest Service around Mt. Shasta for several seasons, which allowed her to become intimately familiar with the fungal inhabitants and ecology of the area. Since then, she has continued with the Forest Service as a botanist for a long-term California-wide meadow monitoring project. She teaches occasional workshops in mushroom and plant identification, both for work and independently. She has also been involved with the California Rare Fungi Working Group since its inception. Her fieldwork and her own studies of plants and fungi are centered in the Sierra Nevada and other mountains of California, and she is currently working on a field guide to mushrooms of these understudied regions with Noah Siegel and Christian Schwarz.
TOPICS COVERED:
EPISODE RESOURCES:
Ep. 98: Hips & Haws Wildcrafts - Ireland's Wild Mushrooms, Herbal Medicines & Explorations of Amanita muscaria (feat. Courtney Tyler)
Ep. 96: Hyphae Labs - The First Annual Oakland Psychedelic Conference (feat. Reggie, Ian and Tomás from Hyphae Labs)
Ep. 95: Spiritual Impulses, the Ecological Self & a Cultural History of the Magic Mushroom (feat. Dr. Andy Letcher)
Ep. 94: Medicinal Mushrooms - Boost Immunity, Improve Memory, Fight Cancer, Stop Infection & Expand Your Consciousness (feat. Dr. Christopher Hobbs)
Ep. 93: Mycoviruses - Fungal Disease, Plant Resilience & Hypovirus Biocontrols (feat. Bryce Alex)
Ep. 92: Fungal Diversity Survey - Championing Fungal Conservation, Together (feat. Bill Sheehan PhD & Gabriela D'Elia)
Ep. 91: Bioluminescent Fungi, Mysterious Endophytes & the Mushrooms of Vanuatu (feat. Brian Perry PhD)
Ep. 90: Fungi Freights - Detroit's Urban Lab & Environmental Studio (feat. Tess Burzynski)
Ep. 89: Forage London - Urban Foraging & Emotional Connection to Green Spaces (feat. John Rensten)
Ep. 88: Amanita Dreamer - Piercing the Veil on Entheogenic Uses of Amanita muscaria (feat. Amanita Dreamer)
Ep. 87: Cryptic Fungi, Laboulbeniales & Pushing the Boundaries of Fungal Exploration (feat. Danny Haelewaters PhD)
Ep. 86: Fungi Foundation - The Future is Fungi (feat. Giuliana Furci & Nathalie Kelley)
Ep. 85: Fungal Plant Pathogens, Dimorphic Transformation & Lessons from Smut Fungi (feat. Dr. Michael Perlin)
Ep. 84: Darren Le Baron - Psychedelic Traditions in Africa, Mushroom Cultivation & Remembering Who We Are (feat. Darren Springer)
Ep. 83: Eat Weeds - Wild Plant Contemplations, Healing with Foraging & Perspectives in Ethnobotany (feat. Robin Harford)
Ep. 82: Zombie Cicadas, Fungivore Millipedes & Forest Pathology (feat. Dr. Matt Kasson)
Ep. 81: Fungi Magazine, Telluride Mushroom Festival & Our Future with Fungi (feat. Britt Bunyard)
Ep. 80: Finding the Mother Tree - Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest (feat. Prof. Suzanne Simard)
Ep. 79: Solutions in Soil Carbon, Fungal Inspiration & Creating New Value Systems (feat. Larry Evans)
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