What is Mycelium Leather? Does it exist?

[SUP]

Considering the stuff that has been passing under the heading of 'vegan' leather, I'm not surprised people are skeptical. A bit of skepticism is good, especially when playing around with fungi. If that makes people who question, modern day 'Luddites' so be it.

This is similar to turkey 'bacon' and veggie 'burgers' - taste fine in their place but not as replacements; as other options? Certainly.

 

[chuck123wapati]

4 hours ago, chrisash said:

we are open to be called living in the past,                        no one is insisting you use alternatives

 

Luddite  that's funny. definition = oh no step back in line sheeple big business( those real insistent ones) cant make money without you, we need to make disposable man made crap and you need to buy it or we wont be rich and you wont be poor. Their products are always almost as good as the natural product they replace.

And that's bad why?  Every person on this forum is searching for knowledge on working leather that has been lost to our great world of modernization and science. We now live in a world full of plastic pollution, eat processed gmo foods that are total garbage and makes us sick while 66% of Americans take medicine daily when a  healthy diet is what they really need  and drink our water from even more plastic bottles because clean water in our homes is a thing of the "PAST" also. 

There is not a d*$n thing wrong with living the past IMO. I'll gladly take it over the future that is being set out for us right now.

Luddite here and proud of it!!!! i have nothing against mushrooms they are great sautéed with onions on a rare elk steak. makes good soup too.

[chuck123wapati]

12 hours ago, Handstitched said:

Yup, 'leather'  crossed with ' vegan ' = " Leagan"  ...wha...?? lol 

Theres a UK  TV series called " Worst Jobs in History" hosted by Tony Robinson that shows how soap was made in the early days, animal  fat mixed with lye ,  quite fascinating . It didn't lather like modern soaps, but it did the job .  These days, soaps are made with so many chemicals with names I can't pronounce . 

HS 

spoiler....  real soap is still made that way. 

[Littlef]

On 11/14/2023 at 7:47 AM, chuck123wapati said:

i just rendered three gallons of tallow from our Elk, it will be our soap.

wow, 3 gallons of Tallow would keep me stocked for black powder for a long long time.

[Handstitched]

1 hour ago, SUP said:

especially when playing around with fungi.

Fungi ? Whats his name ?  lol, sorry its late , almost my bed time. 

 

8 minutes ago, chuck123wapati said:

spoiler....  real soap is still made that way

Shhhhh...  just don't tell the vegans  

So love to try an Elk steak with mushrooms and onions on the barby , with a nice red wine 

HS

[chuck123wapati]

10 minutes ago, Littlef said:

wow, 3 gallons of Tallow would keep me stocked for black powder for a long long time.

oh yea i have a gallon bucket i rendered a few years ago just for patch lube and the six shooters, i mix a bit of bees wax to thicken it a tad.

[chuck123wapati]

2 minutes ago, Handstitched said:

Fungi ? Whats his name ?  lol, sorry its late , almost my bed time. 

 

Shhhhh...  just don't tell the vegans  

So love to try an Elk steak with mushrooms and onions on the barby , with a nice red wine 

HS

my chokecherry/ service berry wine has the most awesome taste  it partners with elk steaks like peas and carrots lol. comes from the same country too.

Sautee your rooms and onions, mix in the pan drippings from the steaks add a touch of choke cherry wine and simmer together a bit then drizzle over that nice rare chunk of heaven!!! 

I would post a pic but it would just be torture for you lol. 

[Littlef]

31 minutes ago, chuck123wapati said:

oh yea i have a gallon bucket i rendered a few years ago just for patch lube and the six shooters, i mix a bit of bees wax to thicken it a tad.

I do the same, mix tallow and bees wax.  In the winter I might add a bit of olive oil if the mix is too hard in the colder temps.

[Sheilajeanne]

Those idiot PETA members want to totally eliminate ALL domestic animals. I really scratch my head when I try to understand just what they think the world will look like if we do this. Wild cows, sheep, goats and pigs just wandering around, munching on the vegan's precious crops? LOL. I think that would make a lot of vegans change their minds about killing animals! Obviously, if people stopped eating meat, no one in their right mind is going to continue to feed their farm animals until they just die of old age. What would be the point? You're spending money on animal feed, and getting absolutely no return for it. Not feeding them would mean letting them starve once they'd chewed their pasture down to the grassroots. Sooo...the obvious solution would be to open the gates and let them go. Or shoot them. But, of course, a vegan isn't going to do that. 

As for going back to the 'good old days' I'm totally for living off the land, growing and harvesting your own food. But I also appreciate popping into the local grocery store to buy a chicken that I don't have to kill, pluck and eviscerate all on my own! My grandmother did exactly that, so I appreciate the hard work that goes into it, and am glad to have a machine do it for me.

My late husband had friends who lived on a tract of land near Toronto which had never been clear cut. They had trilliums popping up in their lawn, like weeds! They gave me permission to go into the wooded section of their property and dig up a couple to take home. Cutting into that virgin soil was like cutting into living tissue. The web of roots was so strong, I needed a very sharp spade to cut around the flower and uproot it. The roots stayed intact, in a square, just as I'd cut them. It really was amazing to see!

I've also seen pictures of the soil structure of grassland prairie that's never been plowed. The grass roots go down more than 3 feet into the earth.

It makes me wish I could have seen this country before the Europeans arrived. The untouched prairie and forest would have been so much more efficient at preventing erosion and catching and filtering rainwater into the ground. Rivers were deeper and had larger, healthier populations of fish and other creatures because of this. 

We can't bring back what once was. But I'm all for preserving small sections of the forest, prairie and mountains in their natural state, so people can see and understand what a healthy, untouched ecosystem really looks like. 

An interesting note: in grassland prairies that have been preserved in their natural state, they stay healthier and the native species thrive better when the land is grazed by cattle. Of course, the original grazers would have been bison and antelopes. 

 

Edited November 15, 2023 by Sheilajeanne

[SUP]

@Sheilajeanne you are so right. Vegans have not really thought so far, have they? Most just talk a lot about things that sound good to them. I don't think most of them wonder whether what they want is plausible. 

Living off the land is what more and more people seem to want to do. Earth ships, for example. Not surprising. After a while, all this materialism is tiring.  Hopefully those who do go back, will not destroy the original flora and fauna in the process. Sometimes, clueless well-meaning people do more harm than good.

And preserving the original lands.. I wish I could see that. Here,  there is a lot of greenery but very little is the original vegetation. There surely are tracts of untouched lands all over the country. I hope they remain hidden and safe and are preserved. Our descendants deserve to see as you say, what a healthy, untouched landscape really looks like.

Veganism is not easy to do just off the bat or by reading about it online. I  know so many vegans with terrible health problems because of their diet.  They seem to do very little that is right, long term. 

I lived my entire childhood and youth as a vegan and did not even know until I came to the US. But our diet was developed over centuries and is well balanced - all the proteins, carbs, minerals etc. included in the balanced meals.  Of course,  my doctor  is delighted and suggested I go back to it.. She took down all the information carefully and is probably encouraging others to eat similarly. She is right. I am much more active and alert since going back to it, for the most part. I cannot resist a good barbecue (learnt to like when living in the mid-west) or burger once in a while though.

 

[Sheilajeanne]

Sup, would be interested to know what your diet was like. Where did you grow up? The Mediterranean diet has been found to be very healthy, based on natural foods like olives, grapes, and of course, pasta and wine, but it's not really vegan.

This tract of forest I mentioned is a park, and is protected from being cut by the government. Environmental groups are fighting hard to maintain the remaining patches of old growth forests, especially the ones on the west coast of Canada, as well as the few remaining native tall and short grass prairies. 

Edited November 15, 2023 by Sheilajeanne

[chuck123wapati]

1 hour ago, Sheilajeanne said:

 

We can't bring back what once was

 

 

don't worry mother earth is millions of years old if not billions she will bring her self back we just wont be here when she does.

 My freezer is half full of delicious greens that are considered weeds and they are more nutritious than most gmo veggies. Literally people pull these out of their gardens and destroy them. Being a good steward of the land, and our own health and wisdom, suggests we become more learned on what is edible food and how to use it. So much traditional knowledge has been lost in the falsehoods we are taught from birth that science has all the right answers. They modify food to be easier to pick , more uniform and to sell not to be healthier. 

My 5th grade science teacher explained the earth as a giant petri dish. It will grow anything to its fullest if one thing dies off then another takes its place there is no end to it until the food supply is gone. If they kill all the cattle because they fart then deer, rabbits, rats, mice or whatever will take up the space and continue to thrive and eat and fart until they exhaust the food supply or are thinned out by other animals. Its a simple concept to understand but is totally ignored by those with an agenda of preaching environmentalism. Plastic is the elephant in the room that we are not allowed to talk about, why because its a product of science, you wont see leather shoes floating in the pacific for years.

 

[SUP]

@Sheilajeanne I grew up in Mumbai, India. My  family was very strictly vegetarian, which meant dairy but no eggs. Our meals were always very structured, as are most Indian meals - vegetables, lentils/pulses, rice/chapati and curds/milk at every meal - everything always freshly made. Desserts rarely, except for fruit. These essentially covered all the nutrient requirements.  But then, I realized I was allergic to milk  - so I became truly vegan while everyone else continued to be vegetarian. My mother cooked more greens, beans etc. to ensure I had sufficient Calcium growing up. My mother and I had meats rarely, maybe once every few months. We couldn't eat more even if we wanted to do so - didn't feel like it. 

This diet is what my doctor is enamoured of. For vegetarians,  we made our curds at home, It was always live cultures - so great for the digestion as well. 

Indians have not much talked about their own food all these years. What is available everywhere as Indian food like butter chicken and lassi with lots of ghee and butter,  is mostly the  food eaten by North Indian farmers - they needed those calories in the past, but no one needs them now! Anyway, that is not what people eat day to day. Rather like no one lives off barbecue and lobster daily.

I know there are protected parks here as well. I hope they continue to be protected. Keeping my fingers crossed that no politician finds that protected lands have oils or other valuables  to dig for.

Sometimes I wonder at people.  I just read an article where some people are thinking of not killing the mycelia completely while making mycelium leather so that it can '"heal itself" if damaged. So they think the mycelia will obey and grow only when directed and otherwise remain dormant. Even if they found a way, I'm not sure I would want to use leather than can come alive. That's just me though.

 

 

 

[purplefox66]

I am a member of peta.

People eating tasty animals 

[Sheilajeanne]

47 minutes ago, SUP said:

Indians have not much talked about their own food all these years. What is available everywhere as Indian food like butter chicken and lassi with lots of ghee and butter,  is mostly the  food eaten by North Indian farmers - they needed those calories in the past, but no one needs them now! Anyway, that is not what people eat day to day. Rather like no one lives off barbecue and lobster daily.

Yes, just like what is sold as Chinese food in most of North America is not at all what the Chinese actually eat! They eat much more vegetables and less meat. Some of the vegetables are things North Americans wouldn't touch, like lotus roots.

SUP, yes, that sounds really crazy! 

Chuck, yes, as one species dies off, others take over. Nature abhors a vacuum. The changes in vegetation and animal life is how biologists know the climate is warming up. I've seen this during my own lifetime - we never used to have opossums in Ontario, as it was too cold for them. Their ears, tails and feet freeze in really cold weather. Now, in the last 30 years or so, they have established breeding populations here. Other species that have moved in within my lifetime are mourning doves and turkey vultures, though they are mostly migratory. But the same thing goes for them - mourning doves' feet freeze easily in sub-zero weather, and the vulture's naked legs and head make them vulnerable to freezing too. I've frequently seen mourning doves with only one foot as a result of having lost one to freezing. Guess they didn't head south early enough!

Edited November 15, 2023 by Sheilajeanne

[chuck123wapati]

22 minutes ago, Sheilajeanne said:

 

Nature abhors a vacuum. 

yup and the climate never quits getting either hotter or colder depending on the cycles. we cant change that either and science models cant reproduce the variables associated with those changes to make any kind of rational guess. Wyoming was once a subtropical swamp full of reptiles as big as houses now it is a desert full of mammals. We cant stop nature.

[SUP]

@chuck123wapati Yes. The one thing we humans should not forget, for all our arrogance, is that we are animals too. We are as dispensable as the dinosaurs and other now extinct life forms. The earth will recover from  most of our idiocy; humans, probably not. In fact, I often think the earth and its flora and fauna would be better off if we were all extinct.

@Sheilajeanne I have moved around so much, I do not have the advantage of seeing the world change as time passes. I wish I did. What a sense of continuity that must be - you have seen what was before, you see what is, now, and can pass that to those coming in.

@purplefox LOL. Most of us are in that camp! 

@Sheilajeanne I agree about Chinese food. I think most food, when shared with other communities and cultures, is modified to suit those tastes. 

[Sheilajeanne]

Chuck, 97% of scientists say that our world is warming up due to increased CO2 emissions. So, you believe they're all wrong? CO2 level have fluctuated over thousands of years, and the temperature has gone up and down accordingly, but never like this:

 

 If it were not for CO2 in our atmosphere, the sun's radiation would just go back out into space, and we'd have a cold, barren planet. CO2 absorbs the radiation reflected off the earth's surface, and turns it into a form of heat that can warm the atmosphere and ground. Unfortunately, this means, the higher the CO2 levels, the more heat is absorbed, and the hotter the planet is going to get. 

[Handstitched]

I just knew I should have got the popcorn out

10 hours ago, chuck123wapati said:

I would post a pic but it would just be torture for you lol. 

After reading that, you're probably right , lol 

9 hours ago, Sheilajeanne said:

Wild cows, sheep, goats and pigs just wandering around, munching on the vegan's precious crops?

Some animals still need to be cared for, whether they get eaten or not, especially sheep , common breeds need to be shorn . I've seen sheep that have been left behind, the fleece is so over grown they cant see out, and so heavy they can hardly walk. ( google ' shrek the sheep ' ) 

6 hours ago, purplefox66 said:

I am a member of peta.

People eating tasty animals 

Thats going to stick with me now 

HS

[Burkhardt]

18 hours ago, chrisash said:

Some on here seem to have closed minds on modern alternatives, no one is insisting you use alternatives

If it's not insisting to be a alternative to leather then why is be associated to vegans? Why isn't it just a alternative product without the association to vegans.

[chrisash]

4 hours ago, Burkhardt said:

If it's not insisting to be a alternative to leather then why is be associated to vegans? Why isn't it just a alternative product without the association to vegans.

Dwight associated it with vegans, the op just asked a question and everyone just got on there high horses about basically nothing apart from leather should be used. funny nobody picked up on Linin thread and Poly threads both totally accepted by a massive majority of leather workers

[Handstitched]

I recently worked with vinyl, does that count ?    

[kgg]

 

13 hours ago, Sheilajeanne said:

So, you believe they're all wrong?

If I remember correctly about 20 years ago weren't all the "experts" saying we were headed for another Ice age. That scare didn't work so they are onto another be afraid. To help reduce the CO2 the main contributors would need to reduce their emissions, China, US and India. However that is going to come at a price of manufacturing all items for the worlds population. Taxing the average joe with carbon taxes isn't going to do anything worth while. People will still need food, transportation, housing, etc.

kgg

[chuck123wapati]

13 hours ago, Sheilajeanne said:

Chuck, 97% of scientists say that our world is warming up due to increased CO2 emissions. So, you believe they're all wrong? CO2 level have fluctuated over thousands of years, and the temperature has gone up and down accordingly, but never like this:

 

 If it were not for CO2 in our atmosphere, the sun's radiation would just go back out into space, and we'd have a cold, barren planet. CO2 absorbs the radiation reflected off the earth's surface, and turns it into a form of heat that can warm the atmosphere and ground. Unfortunately, this means, the higher the CO2 levels, the more heat is absorbed, and the hotter the planet is going to get. 

you forgot this, the caption, as well as most of the story co2 levels before 800,00 years have at times been much higher and as the caption states the data is iffy at best. Your comment is just more proof that this subject is highly misled by those pushing an un proven theory and are to uncaring to actually do their own research on the subject. 

It is undeniable that the climate is an extremely complicated system with many factors that we still do not quite understand, so such statements need to be taken with a grain of salt. Moreover, the further we look back, the more uncertainty there is around the data. Robust evidence “only” spans back 800,000 years thanks to ice cores providing high-resolution records in the form of air bubbles trapped under the freezing snow. 

lol 97% of scientists aren't even climate scientists so don't believe all the bs your fed. But 97% of any funding goes directly to proving climate change science projects which BTW pays the wages of scientists. Plants utilize co2, it benefits them, and as you can plainly see the earth doesn't have more plant life than ever before. I'll refer back to my fifth grade science and the petri dish theory. 

 

[SUP]

That the earth is warming up is true. We can see the results. Surely no one can think that all the climatic changes, the increasing number of natural disasters  happening the world over are planted in the media, as a massive conspiracy.! And it is happening because of human actions. 

There are records and geological evidence other than ice cores that indicate changing climate patterns, going back further than 800,000 years. There are ways to determine time scales.  But that does not mean that global warming is not causing serious harm. After all, all through these millions of years there were no humans to destroy everything in their path - that is what we do, sadly. So we really cannot apply what has happened over the millennia to what is happening now, other than to compare, like the scientists are doing now, and realize that this is unprecedented.

And not everything is a conspiracy @chuck123wapati. No one makes up so much stuff just to get a salary - other than the section of the media that make everything into a conspiracy.

It's all very well to bury one's head in the sand, when one is living in areas which will be the last to be excessively affected by climate changes, like we do. For people in places like the Maldives, for example, who face loss of their entire country, it is reality. Bangladesh faces  loss of lands as does India and many other parts of the world. The US coastline too, for that matter, is threatened.

@kgg You are right. Scientists see changes happening and literally bumble around, trying to find the cause. They are often mistaken and then work their way to determining the actual causes - it could take years or decades, but they are at least trying.  It happens all the time. 

5 hours ago, chrisash said:

everyone just got on there high horses about basically nothing apart from leather should be used.

Hardly. People have been speaking about their own preferences and what they themselves would use - personal choice - not what others should use.

Edited November 16, 2023 by SUP