ABSTRACT
Many fungi in nature have the ability to grow on wood as a substrate. Among the fungi that grow on wood are a smaller number of fungi that produce fruiting bodies desirable for human consumption. Mushroom fruiting bodies are the fleshy sexual reproductive structures of fungi. In Asia there has been a long tradition of harvesting wild wood decaying mushrooms which are much prized as culinary delicacies and promoters of good health. Cultivation of wood decay fungi in the Orient has been practised for a thousand years (Chang, 1993), but in more recent years cultivation has both intensified and spread globally. Cultivation of various mushrooms on wood substrates has become common in Europe and North America since the 1980s.
