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Chanterelle mushrooms are an important part of the economy in Northern Saskatchewan. (Derek Cornet/larongeNOW Staff)
wildfires

Mushroom pickers out millions of dollars as chanterelle patch will take several decades to re-grow

Jun 19, 2025 | 3:52 PM

The destruction of an important mushroom patch about 30 kilometers south of La Ronge will result in a loss of at least $10 million to local pickers over the next 20 years.

Every year, pickers and buyer are drawn to the area because of the high quality of chanterelle mushrooms, which are sought after by consumers all around the world. It is an important economy for northerners and Indigenous Peoples, who spend weeks at a time out on the land harvesting the culinary commodity.

Keewatin Community Development Association CEO Randy Johns, who manages Air Ronge-based Boreal Heartland Herbal Products and is a buyer of chanterelles, explained the area near La Ronge destroyed by wildfire in recent weeks produced 50,000 pounds of mushrooms annually. He noted pickers were paid $12 per pound in 2024.

Johns added pickers receive at least $500,000 per year with the end of market value being closer to $1 million.

“I don’t think people really understand how big it is because you can pick mushrooms every year and it takes 30 years for those mushrooms to come back,” he said. “The total value in over 30 years, that fire might have cost $30 million.”

Johns believes the price of chanterelles will likely go up in 2025 as more pickers descend on another large mushroom patch along Highway 165 known as Bear River. He thinks there will be more pressure on that patch as it is usually accessed by pickers from Deschambeault Lake, southern Saskatchewan communities and now La Ronge.

Buyers gather at the interesection of Highway 2 and 165 every year to purchase mushrooms from pickers. (Derek Cornet/larongeNOW Staff)

Jacey Bell, who is an instructor with the University of Saskatchewan’s Department of Biology, thinks it will take about 20 years for mushrooms to start to return to the area and 40 years for harvests to return to what they once were.

“I have a feeling it will be pretty sparse for the foreseeable future,” she said.

Bell explained chanterelle mushrooms like growing in old-growth jack pine forests with sandy soil conditions. She said the hyphae (a long, branching, filamentous structure) of the fungus (mushroom) will grow around the live growing tips of the tree roots, leading to an exchange in nutrients.

“Basically, depending on the extent of the fire and how devastating it is, if there aren’t any older trees that survived, the fungus is probably not going to do very well because it is losing the nutrients it’s getting from the trees,” Bell remarked.

derek.cornet@pattisonmedia.com