Where and how our mushrooms grow
At Purana, we are dedicated to sourcing the highest quality organic functional mushrooms, and we believe that understanding growing environments is essential to achieving this goal. Our team has worked diligently to review and assess mushroom growers and carefully select growers with the best production environments for our mushrooms. We work closely with these growers to ensure that their operations meet and exceed our quality standards.
Purana's functional mushrooms are grown in various controlled settings and environments, including organic farms and sterile greenhouses. The production environment is specifically designed to optimize the growth and quality of our mushrooms. Growing begins with high-quality substrates that provide essential minerals for healthy mushroom growth. The entire process is carefully monitored and controlled to maintain proper conditions for optimal mushroom growth and nutrient preservation.
Purana mushrooms are currently grown overseas, mainly in various regions of China. You may have heard about mushrooms growing locally. We understand local ingredient sourcing is often highly valued. So you may wonder, why do we choose to source our ingredients overseas vs. locally? The answer is simple: We are committed to providing you with the highest-quality functional mushrooms while keeping prices affordable for everyday use.
Functional mushrooms have been a part of traditional Chinese medicine for thousands of years. Our team has found that their combination of traditional methods, modern technology, and access to the right resources have enabled us to achieve an exceptional quality that is difficult to replicate domestically. The farms we work with in China have significant experience with mushrooms, and they are dedicated to meeting our rigorous standards.
Read on to learn more about how some of our mushrooms are grown!
Reishi
Our Reishi fruiting bodies are grown on Daunwood logs also known as Basswood. They are grown in the high-altitude regions of the 9 Dragon Mountain Range in China. The logs are harvested every October from the pristine forests in the areas surrounding the farm, at minimum 20 years old. They are sterilized in a heat chamber then wrapped in a custom cover and fermented for 2-3 months. They are unwrapped in January / February, sporulated, then buried shallowly with just a little bit of dirt over them in tented greenhouses that let in just the right amount of full spectrum sunlight and keep just the right amount of air and humidity. Gentle flows of irrigation around the tents also help with keeping the desired moisture level.
The Reishi mushrooms grow throughout the spring and into summer, when they produce full fruiting bodies. By early fall, once they’ve matured and spored, they can then be harvested, and the cycle can continue on each log for several years producing large fruiting bodies that produce extremely high content of beneficial compounds and high levels of spore production. The triterpene content, ganoderic acid, polyphenols, amino acids, and polysaccharides such as beta glucans are most optimal using these methods as confirmed by third-party COAs from each batch showing no heavy metals, no pesticides, some of the most potent and clean Reishi on the planet.
Lion’s Mane
Our Lion’s Mane fruiting bodies are grown in opaque film greenhouses in the high-altitude areas of the 9 Dragon Mountain Range in China. They are inoculated in grain and grown on pressed logs made from local wood chips.
A mixture of local hardwood chips, a byproduct of local tree harvesting, are combined with a long-proven blend of vermiculite, bran and some added nutrients, sterilized in large ovens, then pressed into 20 x 6-inch logs. The logs are then inoculated in a colonization chamber. The colonization takes between 14-21 days, during such time the mycelium spreads throughout the pressed log substrate.
Once fully colonized, the logs are placed in opaque film-illuminated fruiting chambers on custom shelving that allows for optimal sunlight penetration, ideal humidity via misting, gentle air flow in combination with suitable perforation of the logs, and overall efficient utilization of space.
Once in place within the fruiting chambers, the pins, which are the beginning stages of the mushroom fruiting body, begin to appear rather swiftly within 2-3 days. The Lion’s Mane keep growing and are ready to harvest in approximately 7-14 days, temperature dependent.
When the fruiting bodies are harvested, they are typically anywhere from 4-6 inches in diameter. They are carefully trimmed by hand with shears for aesthetic appeal, being sourced not only for use in high-end supplements but also as a delicacy for high-end food sector demand. Of the medicinal mushrooms, Lion’s Mane is one that you can eat much larger quantities of.
Taking the world by storm as a tonic for the nervous system, the beneficial compounds in Lion’s Mane called Hericenones that stimulate neural regenerative and neural protective functions in the brain and throughout the body, are most effective when extracted from fruiting bodies and concentrated to at least 5:1 or higher.
Turkey Tail
Our Turkey Tail is wildcraft grown on a variety of hardwoods in a Certified Organic region of the Northeast China Plain Deciduous Forests Ecoregion, a region historically known as Ancient Manchuria, nestled up close to Russia and Mongolia. The plain is surrounded by mountains on the north and east and supports some of China's largest and most pristine forest tracts, where Turkey Tail has been wild harvested for centuries, dating as far back as the 12th century. The northern region hosts extensive conifer forests characterized by Mongolian Oak and Daurian Birch in most zones and Sawtooth Oak in others.
Uniquely favourable for Turkey Tail production the way nature intends, our mushrooms grow in this region on dead or dying hardwood trees, or stumps, most commonly the oaks. Turkey Tail grows year-round in this region, taking advantage of the temperate climate, ideal humidity, and fertile soil across all seasons but is especially fruitful from May through December of each year.
Deep in these northeastern mountains, generations of small farmers have evolved into small industries that continue to dedicate themselves to the natural cultivation of these mushrooms and have developed one of the largest regions of Certified Organic Turkey Tail production in the world. These families are close to the land and connected to food production as a preservation of these living forests.
Caps are harvested at approximately 1 to 4 inches in width, stemless, shaped like fans, then dried in temperature and humidity-controlled chambers before being prepared and shipped to the 9-Dragon Mountain region for processing.
From fruiting bodies to concentrated extracts
Purana's mushroom products are made exclusively from fruiting bodies, without mycelium, grain, starches or fillers. After growing, fruiting bodies are processed through a rigorously implemented series of extraction methods using hot water, alcohol and other proprietary techniques to produce the highest quality extract. The extract is finally tested for potency levels of beta-glucans, triterpenes, sterols and other bioactive compounds to ensure product standards are met. Certified North American 3rd party labs do all testing before shipping, in adherence to USDA Organic, Good Production Practices (GPP) and Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP).
Our production environment is of utmost importance in delivering the highest-quality functional mushrooms available today. Purana takes great pride in ensuring that each mushroom is grown in a safe, sustainable, and responsible environment. We are committed to always ensuring you can trust us for the best quality mushrooms. If you have any questions regarding our production environment or would like to learn more about Purana’s products and services, please don’t hesitate to contact us. We are always happy to help!
