Our presenter is our very own Sharmin Gamiet, with the topic “Towards Understanding Macrofungi of the Northwest Territories”.

After completing a project for Environment Canada on “General Status of the Species – Macrofungi,” it became clear that there were significant knowledge gaps on the status of the macrofungi in the Northern areas of Canada. Dr. Suzanne Carriere from the Wildlife Branch of the Government of the Northwest Territories set out to rectify this situation. For the past 4 years, Sharmin and others have been visiting forest sites, mostly around the Yellowknife area but from other areas as well, to collect, photograph, document and voucher macrofungi, with the goal of creating a database of macrofungi for the Northwest Territories. This talk, an update on the project, will discuss the challenges faced in identifying forest macrofungi north of the sixtieth parallel.

Sharmin Gamiet has been working with fungi for over 30 years, focusing on mushrooms and their relatives found in the Pacific Northwest (BC, Washington and Oregon). She has trained at UBC and the University of Washington using the Friesien species concepts (macro and micro morphological, rather than genetic traits, are used to group fungi). Sharmin has led mushroom forays throughout BC for many years and enjoys sharing and discussing mushrooms in their habitats.