A growing network of Black mushroom enthusiasts, cultivators and researchers across the United States is contributing to the expanding field of mycology while exploring the cultural and historical connections between fungi and the African diaspora.Their work comes as interest in fungi has accelerated globally, driven by ecological research, culinary trends and the rise of citizen science.

Amateur researchers and independent cultivators have increasingly played a central role in identifying fungal species and documenting ecosystems, partly because professional mycology remains a relatively small scientific field.

Maria Pinto, a Jamaican American naturalist and writer based in Newton, Massachusetts, traces her fascination with fungi to an encounter in 2013 with an American yellow fly agaric mushroom while walking through nearby woods. The poisonous fungus, notable for its vivid yellow coloring and metallic sheen, immediately captured her attention.

“It forced me down on my knees to examine it further, because it didn’t look real,” Pinto said. “It looked like it was from another dimension.”

That experience eventually led Pinto deeper into mycology, the study of fungi, and toward researching the relationship between Black communities and fungal traditions throughout the Americas. In her recent book, Fearless, Sleepless, Deathless: What Fungi Taught Me about Nourishment, Poison, Ecology, Hidden Histories, Zombies, and Black Survival, Pinto documents Black mushroom growers, foragers and researchers working across North and South America and the Caribbean. Fearless, Sleepless, Deathless: What Fungi Taught Me about Nourishment, Poison, Ecology, Hidden Histories, Zombies, and Black Survival

Scientists estimate that Earth may contain roughly three million fungal species, though only a small percentage have been formally identified.

Fungi, which include mushrooms, molds and yeasts, were not formally recognized as a distinct biological kingdom until 1969, making the field comparatively young relative to other biological sciences.

Pinto said Black participants in mycology often remain geographically isolated despite growing interest in the field.“We exist, but in isolation around the country,” she said. “I think there are definitely efforts to mitigate that, or to actually get us together, but not a really concerted one.”

In Oregon, Elan Hagens has spent decades working with fungi through foraging, cultivation and education. Her interest began during childhood while attending environmental and nature-based programs in the Portland area.

Later, after appearing on the 2008 CBS reality television series Greatest American Dog, she learned that dogs could be trained to locate truffles, underground fungi valued in high-end cuisine.At the time, Oregon’s commercial truffle industry was still emerging. In 2011, Hagens founded temptresstruffles.com⁠, a company focused on truffle foraging and mushroom education. She later shifted from dog training toward workshops on mushroom cultivation and fungal identification.

One of her most memorable discoveries came in 2020 while walking beside a river in the Portland metropolitan area. She spotted a massive oyster mushroom growing high on a tree trunk.

“People were walking and jogging in front of me, and nobody is seeing this mushroom,” Hagens said. “It’s like the biggest thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”After returning later with equipment to harvest it safely, she prepared the edible portions as potstickers.

Hagens has also organized guided mushroom walks aimed at introducing Black, Indigenous and other underrepresented communities to fungal ecology.

During one event in Oregon, participants encountered sulphur tuft mushrooms, known for faint bioluminescent properties and their ability to glow under ultraviolet light.

“That’s something that people love to see, because it’s more than just: ‘Oh, that’s a poisonous mushroom,’ or: ‘That’s an edible mushroom,’” Hagens said. “It’s something that makes them think outside the box.”

Hagens frequently collaborates with William Padilla-Brown, a Pennsylvania-based ecological researcher and fungi cultivator who has become a prominent figure in independent mycology education in the United States.

Padilla-Brown founded mycofest.net⁠ in 2015 as an annual festival focused on ecology, fungi research and public education. Held in central Pennsylvania, the event combines scientific presentations, guided foraging walks, workshops and fungal identification services using DNA testing technology.

“I don’t even know that many Black mycologists,” Padilla-Brown said. “I’m just waiting for more folks to show up for real.”The 2026 edition of MycoFest is scheduled to take place from July 31 to August 2 at Four Quarters Interfaith Sanctuary.

The same year he launched the festival, Padilla-Brown established mycosymbiotics.com⁠, a business focused on cultivating fungi such as cordyceps and producing mushroom extracts.

Largely self-taught through books and mentorships, Padilla-Brown said his interest in fungi began during adolescence after experimenting with psychedelic mushrooms.At 17, he was arrested on cannabis-related charges. After becoming a parent several years later, he redirected his interests into legal mushroom cultivation and educational work.

His business now includes mushroom farming, workshops and fungal product development. He recently completed a documentary on truffle culture and helped establish the mycosymbiotics.com⁠, an agricultural cooperative supporting fungi producers.

Padilla-Brown also received a two-year grant worth $26,000 from the United States Department of Agriculture to study the potential for cultivating native truffles in the northeastern United States.

Much of his recent work has focused on preserving fungal biodiversity through cultivation and storage techniques.

“I’ll be freezing them all in the final preservation here to preserve sensitive organisms into the future,” Padilla-Brown said. “I just want to hold on to them. It’s like a modern Noah’s ark kind of vibe.”

For Pinto, fungi also provide a framework for understanding cultural continuity and survival across the African diaspora. In her writing, she traces linguistic and culinary links connecting Black communities and mushrooms, including the Jamaican patois term “junjo” for fungus and “djon djon,” the name for prized edible black mushrooms used in Haitian cuisine.

She also references the Butiko clan in Uganda, whose symbolism and oral traditions incorporate mushrooms.These discoveries, Pinto said, challenged assumptions that mushrooms held little significance within Black cultural histories.

“The more I learn about the ancient origins and tantalizing futurity of fungi, about their centrality to healthy ecosystems and their adaptability, about their potential for earthly and mental remediation, the more I’ve realized that my kinship lines feel more mycelial than tree-like,” she wrote in the introduction to her book.

“Like fungi, the stuff I’m made of has the power to move in darkness, to thrive undetected, to quietly work until such a time as there’s nothing left to do but fruit.”