How common is chaga?

Cody Hofsommer

Cody Hofsommer

Joined
Dec 2, 2011
Messages
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So bladeforums has taught me a lot of things. I grew up here in northern Minnesota, camping every summer. I knew nothing of "bushcraft". Last summer I learned about fat wood. I couldn't believe that something that cool was so prevalent around here. There is a fatwood stump every 50 yards. Just last week I learnt about chaga. So I went for walk today in my woods. Maybe 20 minutes and found 1/3 of a icecream pail of the stuff. So..... Is this chaga? Is it that common?
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Depends on the area however it grows on a statistically very very small percentage of trees. Use that chaga for tea and firecraft. The softer yellowish areas are best for firecraft.
 
Cool, thanks. I'll have to let it dry for a while and check it out. I have lots of birch here, and lots of chaga!
 
keep digging into that tree, the insides the part you want. the good stuff will feel like stale popcorn.

don't make the mistake of striking sparks to close to your stash, or the next thing you know, poof.

I know this because it happened to me, the harder stuff is good for tea, tastes like birch bark smells.

the Ojibwa name is skitogan.

enjoy it, we don't have any down here, there are exceptions, but not enough.
 
Chaga has started be a bit overharvested in some areas. You can still find it pretty commonly though.

I just made a big 3 gallon batch of strong chaga tea for a batch of mead I made today:

 
Thanks for the info guys, I guess I'm lucky then. I heard on you tube that 2 in ten thousand trees will grow it, in my woods it more like 1 in 20 birch will. Of course there is lots of other kinds of trees In the woods.

After picking that pile, I was walking around and found a nice fat wood stump. I gathered some twigs and before you knew it I had a little fire going. I set a wet piece of chaga on the fire and got it going. I put out the fire, carted the chaga 150 yards to the wheeler, the drove the wheeler 3/8 of a mile, then started a fire by blowing the ember into some tinder. I carted the ember in a piece of birch bark held in my hand. I love this site! Thanks for all the info and fun I have reading and trying out things that I read here.
 
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heresthedeal said:
keep digging into that tree, the insides the part you want. the good stuff will feel like stale popcorn.

don't make the mistake of striking sparks to close to your stash, or the next thing you know, poof.

I know this because it happened to me, the harder stuff is good for tea, tastes like birch bark smells.

the Ojibwa name is skitogan.

enjoy it, we don't have any down here, there are exceptions, but not enough.
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What kind of recipe do you use for the tea? Chaga is pretty common here, but I've never tried making tea out of it.
 
plue said:
What kind of recipe do you use for the tea? Chaga is pretty common here, but I've never tried making tea out of it.
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I use a wood rasp on the hard stuff to grind it up. I don't get it to fine, about the size of 4 shot pellets. (couldn't think of anything else for size reference)

Then a table spoon in a tea bag (I got some tea bag material at a coffee shop) and then just pour not quite boiling water over it in a coffee cup.

Let it sit till cool enough to drink and sweeten with honey.

I looked it up on the net, and some of the methods were a bit complex for me, I don't usually drink tea. A friend of mine told me that was the best way he had found and it seems to work pretty well.

I have heard of people using an old coffee pot for it too.

The table spoon measure I use isn't exact, it's a heaping table spoon in the tea bag.

If you get some of the outside, the crusty black part, it tastes different, I didn't like it as much, YMMV.

If you read about it on the net it suppose to cure everything except broken bones, I don't know anything about that but it tastes pretty good.
 
I usually decoct chaga tea, as opposed to an infusion. I like to let it simmer for at least 6 hours, and sometimes 12 or more.

In the winter I will sometimes keep a crockpot going with a chunk of chaga inside, replenishing the water as I use it. I generally use about a golf ball cut up into chunks (my favorite chaga processing tool is my BK2) per gallon of water. The chaga is good for several days or up to a week.

Good chaga tea, imho, has a pleasantly thick mouth feel, a hint of interesting bitterness, isn't sweet but tastes vaguely of maple and vanilla. Delicious with cream or butter mixed in while it's hot.
 
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Thanks guy, sounds like something to try for sure. Which part of the mushroom do you use, heresthedeal you mentioned it's not the outside, is it more of the ligter / orange part or somewhere in between?
 
plue said:
Thanks guy, sounds like something to try for sure. Which part of the mushroom do you use, heresthedeal you mentioned it's not the outside, is it more of the ligter / orange part or somewhere in between?
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I'm no expert, just broke up a bunch of it.

The part that will take a spark is the soft part, usually in the middle or close to it, but sometimes it seems to run in vanes through the harder parts.

I'm sure you could use the soft part for tea, but that would be a waste of the good stuff.

The black scaly part on the outside is the crust part that I don't use. The hard part closest to the outside is the part I use for tea.

Hope that helps. It does go pretty far into the tree, it's not just the part that sticks out, you have to dig into it, a hatchet and a chisel works.
 
I use mostly the brown/tan interior, and some of the black exterior.

Details here:

[video=youtube;liMo7Q_U-YA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liMo7Q_U-YA[/video]
 
For chaga tea I just take the chaga from the tree and boil for about 10 minutes. Also chaga incense within my shelter are nice. Got to 24.39 minutes in my looong video for the chaga tea and incense.

[video=youtube;8JEpDsZQBbI]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JEpDsZQBbI[/video]

For firecraft you can spark a chunch of chaga to life with a knife as I did here.

[video=youtube;_oqPhLZCsoM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_oqPhLZCsoM[/video]

Or if the firecraft grade is a bit sub par aka harder you can turn it into dust then toss a spark using quartz, chert, flint etc etc off of carbon steel on to it.









Possession of chaga is like having superpowers. :)



Works even easier with a firesteel.
 
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Chaga is awesome. You can do so much with it.

Note, though, that for much of the medicinal properties of chaga to be available to us, chaga has to be decocted, ie, simmered for a long period of time.
 
I noticed that several people are stating not to use the black part of the chaga for tea. The black part is the highest in antioxidants (higher than blueberries and acai berries.) I use the entire fungus medicinally. It has anti cancer properties, helps diminish the side effects of radiation and chemotherapy, regulates both blood sugar and blood pressure, and makes a darned tasty tea. It's known in Chinese medicine as "the king of herbs". I would agree wholeheartedly!
JWL said:
Chaga is awesome. You can do so much with it.

Note, though, that for much of the medicinal properties of chaga to be available to us, chaga has to be decocted, ie, simmered for a long period of time.
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My understanding is the good compounds in the black part are only soluble in alcohol. People make tinctures of it. The good compounds in the brown and yellow parts are water soluble. A lot of claims out there. Will be decades before we have a proper understanding.

I usually make tea in camp by simmering for a couple hours using about a 1" cube of brown chaga for each quart of water. Each cube can be brewed multiple times but the first pass tastes the best. I too sometimes use the crock-pot method when at home. Am thinking about trying the ground up powder in an old camping percolating coffee pot one of these days. The longer it's brewed the stronger it gets.

Chaga can be dried and used in its uncharred state, whether it has been brewed or not, with many forms of fire ignition such as F&S, hand drill, bow drill, solar, ferro, etc. Brewed will make an ember just as well with solar or ferro as unbrewed. Brewed won't catch a spark from F&S quite as well as unbrewed, yet it will still catch. The more yellow in that particular piece the better chaga catches sparks from F&S.

Yep, fungus of 10,000 trees. Some areas I've filled a gallon ziploc in under two hours. Other areas hiked sunup to sundown and only found two chagas. Most areas found none at all. I think the main trick is the more birches in an area the better the chances.

Fresh chaga is soft and can be knocked off the tree by throwing rocks, batting it with a stick, etc. To get the most off the tree a hatchet works best. Knife or saw will do if that's what ya have. Chaga is heavy and very wet when fresh. Even sliced up it can take up to three weeks to fully dry. If you store it while it still has the slightest bit of moisture left in it, fungus will grow on it. Mostly white though I have seen black and grey as well.

As with any fungus, I slice it up with a knife right away after harvesting while it is still at its softest. Not soft exactly, but the softest it will ever be. Wet it is tough to slice and difficult to control the cut. Dry it is even worse! Crumbles and breaks off how it wants. Though heavy when wet, dry it is light as a feather and hard as a rock. A very brittle, crumbly rock.
 
I've been in some areas where i could fill up a garbage can of chaga in a 50 yard radiius .

Any danger of chaga ingestion ? A Russian gal told me to use it with caution .... do they know something we don't ?
 
Pentlatch said:
I've been in some areas where i could fill up a garbage can of chaga in a 50 yard radiius .

Any danger of chaga ingestion ? A Russian gal told me to use it with caution .... do they know something we don't ?
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I drink the tea and never had any issues and there must have been little chips floating around.
 
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