Cordyceps Mushroom

Hi, this is Rita Hogan, and welcome to the Dogs Are Individuals podcast. I'm a clinical canine herbalist and I've been practicing for over 20 years. This podcast is all about your dog through an herbal lens. So let's get to it and dive right in. Hey, everyone, welcome to the podcast.

Welcome back, welcome back, welcome back. This is Rita Hogan. Hey. So we are going to talk about cordyceps mushroom today. I was doing some work with cordyceps this past week and I thought, hey, I'm going to share some information about cordyceps. I did share some information, I think this past February a little bit about cordyceps, but it was about adaptogens in general. So we're going to talk about that. And I do want to thank my sponsor, Real Mushrooms. I sell real mushrooms in my store. I sell a lot of mushrooms in my store. But I do sell their products, I sell their powders. I wanted to tell you about something interesting about you versus your dog today, about real mushrooms. So I was on their website the other day and noticed that they had creamer color coconut creamer and dairy creamer all for us, us peeps. And, you know, you gotta take care of yourself in order to take care of your dog and because we're all connected, right? And what fun is it? Have to have some coconut creamer for your tea or coffee. And it. I was really impressed because they're using organic sources. They like organic coconut milk powder, organic maple sugar powder, the five defenders, which is the, you know, it's the turkey tail, it's the reishi, the maitake shiitake chaga. And then they use lucuma powder and Ceylon cinnamon and sea salt. So how is that?

10 calories per teaspoon.

10 calories per teaspoon. Love it, love it, love it. Check it out. And then they have functional dairy creamer. And what I was impressed with is that they're using organic cream. Most people don't care. They just are like, here's creamer. We're not using organic sources. It's too expensive, blah, blah, blah. But I think the retail price this is 1747. You get a big pack of creamer. 6.35 ounces, 180 grams. And the calories on that is 10 calories per teaspoon, 70 calories for 2 tablespoons. I'm loving all of it. I want to give it a try. I'm totally going to give it a try. It has 1 gram of protein in it for 2 tablespoons, 3 grams of added sugar. That's from the organic maple sugar. And let's see, 18 milligrams of cholesterol and total carb is 5 grams. So 2% there. And I'm like, for me, like, the only added sugar that I have during the day is a little bit of honey in my tea. And I'll put a little splash of. I usually do the organic A2 creamer, or if I'm making my own, like, nut milk or something, I might add it in there. Depending on what I'm doing. I'm getting one of those. I think it's called Moo something where you can make your own nut milks. I'm going to give that a try. I'll let you know how that goes. But yeah, so functional. Dairy creamer powder or coconut dairy creamer powder. They also have a Five Defenders chocolate bar, 75% dark chocolate. And mushrooms. Five Defenders mushrooms. That's kind of fun. You know, the biggest thing with things that we have is we just don't want to do these things every day. You know, we get in these habits of just having the same thing every day because it makes us feel comfortable, it makes us feel cozy. And it's ritual. And ritual is very important in life, whether we understand that or not. And so I recommend having a ritual with different things. This morning I had dandelion root tea. I had tremella mushroom and, oh, lion's mane and a little bit of honey and a splash of organic cream. So loving it. That's what I recommend. Just mix it up. Love it and mix it up. So we're going to talk about cordyceps today. And cordyceps mushroom is a little tricksy. And the reason why it's tricksy is because the regular mushroom, the regular cordyceps mushroom is not readily available. Okay. And that's Cordyceps sinensis. S I N E N S I S. Cordyceps sinensis is this spore that gets in this caterpillar. And traditionally it's grown inside the bat moth, those poor little suckers. It's really hard to source and it's very expensive. So if you're getting Cordyceps sinensis at a cheap price, you're most likely not getting Cordyceps sinensis. It grows high in the mountains and it grows out of a caterpillar. It feeds off the caterpillar pillar. It's a parasitic fungus or parasitic spore. And. And then it, it. The fruiting body comes out of the mushroom. I mean, out of the caterpillar, the mushroom comes out of the Caterpillar. So what you're getting is Cordyceps militarius and it's cultivated cordyceps, it's orange, it's, well, it's quite beautiful and it's warm to hot. So I would say it is going to be more on the hot side. Warm to hot in Energetics is compared to. Right. So it's gonna be very warming. If your dog is cold, if they are in a disease state and they are cold and they're, you know, more on the lethargic side, they've got some bacterial overgrowth and they're always wanting warmth, you know it's gonna be warming to them. But if your dog is just nicely healthy, cool, it's going to be quite heating for them, which is good for your dog. That's cool. But if your dog is already warm or hot. Hot. Hot dogs don't do well with this mushroom at all. But some can't even bear it in a formula because it's just too stimulating. But a nice healthy warm dog is going to be fine with it. And remember, Energetics is all about consistency. So you just don't want to give it like all the time. Right? Don't give it all the time. So you can use it for cool to cold dogs, you can use it for false heat, you can use it for tension and you're going to use the fruiting body and you want to, you know, if you want to try it out and you don't know your dog's energetics, I highly recommend my energetics course on canineherbalism.com but you could try it under supervision of like a holistic vet or an herbalist and see how your dog reacts and just observe them and see if they get get hot in action. Herbs and mushrooms and natural things have action and in action. Cordyceps are adaptogenic. They help dogs and people deal with stress and they help have a positive effect on the adrenals for the most part. Now if the adrenals are completely burnt out, they might be too stimulating. So definitely use it in a formula. They're anti inflammatory systemically, they're antihistamine, they're antioxidant, they help the liver, they're anti tumor, anti cancer, they're an immune modulator. They help your immune system have its best life. Okay. They help your immune system be the best that it can can be. They might be a little stimulate too stimulating for autoimmune. I think that the jury's still out on that one. I'm definitely not in cordyceps. Expert. I'm better with other mushrooms, but I'm definitely not an expert. But this is what I know. So some constituents that cordyceps has is it has glutamic acid, palmitic acid, polysaccharides, sterols, tyrosine, valine, proline, those are amino acids. Again, really high in antioxidants. Beta glucan, cordycepsin, which is in the fruiting body only, and iron, magnesium, selenium, B12. So these are things that, you know, when a natural substance has vitamins and minerals, we want to be aware of that. Especially if we're already supplementing. We don't want to give too much of something. But yeah, it has iron, magnesium, selenium and B12. So some cofactors or symptoms that can help us figure out if it's well indicated for your dog is like varied when it comes to cordyceps. We have, you know, adrenal depletion, we have adrenal depletion, we have arthritis, different type of lung weakness. So inflammation in the lungs, kennel cough, asthma, lung cancer, those are things that cordyceps can help out with. Chronic fatigue, lethargy, because it's stimulating. Right. Be very careful using cordyceps with dogs that have seizures. You want to definitely use it in a formula and don't use too much. Endocrine disorders in general. And then liver issues, liver weakness, hepatitis, fatty liver, inflammation in the liver, also in the kidneys. Inflammation in the kidneys, that's another thing that we can use cordyceps for. Kidney weakness in general. It's very systemic. You know, mushrooms and herbs, you know, they have very systemic reach for the most part. And this one really kind of ticks all the boxes. Low immune function, leaky gut. So we had a poor appetite. So we have gastrointestinal, we have lung, kidney, liver. There's some lymphatic, like some affinity towards the lymphatic system. Not, not the greatest, but some. And it really gives us that systemic kind of weakness help. And again, I really love it in a formula. You can use it for cats. I would probably use a liquid remedy for cats and just use like one drop and see how things go for that. It really, it can increase estrogen, that's one thing cordyceps can do. So I use it in non estrogenic cancers for people, but in dogs. Cordyceps helps promote cancer cell death and it helps prevent metasis. So that's the spread of cancer cells. And it can be used during chemotherapy which it helps protect the liver and the Kidneys during chemotherapy. So it is a very good cancer mushroom. And in the gastrointestinal tract, it's good for cool dogs with leaky gut. And it's really high in polysaccharides. And it's an anti inflammatory, so it helps bring down inflammation in the large intestine. And again, it's antihistamine and it supports a balanced histamine response in the heart. It has heart benefits. It really benefits the entire vascular system, but it helps regulate blood pressure. Not broad pressure, blood pressure. It strengthens the heart muscle, it improves circulation. That's where it has an effect on blood circulation and also lymph circulation. It helps improve blood flow to other organs like the liver and the kidneys. And again, I said it's immune modulating. It helps the immune system live its best life. So it strengthens the immune system and it helps increase the number of natural killer cells which help the body defend itself by killing pathogenic bacteria and viruses. So go cordi. I did say it had an affinity towards the kidneys and it helps the kidneys function after the kidneys kind of take a hit. It's good for like Lyme based nephritis. It can help in cases of kidney failure. You can blend it with nettle seed. It can help protect the kidneys and liver, definitely by improving blood flow, which I just talked. Oh my God, can I not say blood today? Brud fro. What? What? Improving blood flow, which helps defend against disease. Okay, so the liver, if there's high enzymes. Liver is tricky. We don't get a lot of fatty livers in our dogs right now, but we do get them in people. But for dogs in general, we get a lot of liver inflammation. We get a lot of high liver enzymes. And cordyceps can help the liver increase. Glucothione and super oxidized oxide dismutase sod, which is very important at reducing inflammation and oxidation in the liver system. And that can help decrease liver enzymes. I like to combine it with burdock root to reduce liver fat in people or dogs that are showing liver fat, which is really sad in dogs eating a really high process diet like those bottom shelf kibbles or even some of those middle or top shelf kibbles, depending on what they are. It is definitely a good herb for lung weakness. It dilates the airways, it increases blood oxygen levels. It's, you know, mushrooms are cellular healing, which I absolutely love. And herbs heal at a cellular level. Phytoembryonics heal at a cellular level. Cordyceps especially benefits lung weakness in general and like kennel cough, asthma, bronchitis, dogs that suffer from those types of things and people. And remember, we're looking at cool to cold energetics, okay, or slightly warm, very healthy warm. But with the warm, we want to, we don't want to give it every single day. With the cool energetics, we definitely can give it on a continuous basis for a while. Cordyceps helps relieve stress in the nervous system. It helps activate parasympathetic activity. And we want that, we want to activate parasympathetic activity so that our dogs can rest and relax and digest. And even though cordyceps is stimulating, it doesn't mean that it's going to stimulate a dog into sympathetic excess where we go into fight or flight or freeze. Especially if our energetics are correct, it's going to reduce inflammation and balance hormones, which in turn is going to help with anxiety. So if you're using the dried extract extracted powder like from real mushrooms, you could do like a 16th of a teaspoon for an extra small dog, 8th of a teaspoon for a small dog, medium dog, quarter teaspoon, large dog, half a teaspoon, extra large dog, half a teaspoon to three quarters. That's your basis. That's like you're starting with mushroom powders. You can go up quite a bit. You can double that dose depending. Now remember, it's a stimulating mushroom, so start low and slow and work your way up. With a glycerin tincture, you're gonna do one drop per pound of your dog's body weight. And I don't necessarily recommend a decoction, but if you're using a liquid decoction of cordyceps mushroom, 1 teaspoon for an extra small dog, 1 tablespoon for a small dog, 1/4 cup for medium dog, large dog, half a cup, an extra large dog, one cup. Cordyceps is just really hard to source. As kind of a layperson hard to source. So I just use the dried powders and the glycerin tinctures and the tinctures that have a combination like in Myco dog, they have two remedies, their, their clarity and their breathe. Both have cordyceps in them. So long term use, you want to be careful because what can heal can also cause. So long term use can deplete the adrenals, even though short term. And when I mean long term, I mean months and months and months. You know, like for, for long term is subjective. And so for this mushroom, long term would be like four to six months. I wouldn't do that. I would probably pulse that, give a couple weeks off and then start again. Because it can deplete the adrenals if used long term and without being well indicated. You know, we want to make sure things are well indicated. The more symptoms or cofactors your dog has, the better it is indicated. And use energetics as your first indication when using cordyceps for warm energetics. Combined it with cooling herbs or mushrooms to help balance it out. Like maitake or chaga or lion's mane or tremella. Those are more neutral. Turkey tail, those are more neutral to cooling mushrooms. You can balance that out and help bring down some of that heat. If you see symptoms of aggression, restlessness, agitation or excessive humping or peeing in the house after using cordyceps, after starting something with cordyceps in it discontinue and it should go away. So, you know, looking at cordyceps, it, I mean, it definitely sounds like a fun mushroom, right? It is. Again, it needs to be well indicated. I love cordyceps mushroom. I think it's awesome and I love it best in a formula. The Five Defenders is a good formula for cordyceps. Again, there's the Michael dog formulas. The Breathe and Clarity, I believe have that in there. That's another one. You can mix your mix and match. You can get some cordyceps powder and add it to your dog's like a small amount of food or broth. And you can mix it with other mushrooms too and try those out. Things that are well indicated for your individual dog. Speaking of mushrooms. So our podcast sponsor, we have a new one. So this is Fido's bone broth. Okay. Now Fido's bone broth is kind of not near and dear to my heart because I helped formulate their bone broths. I formulated their digestive, their longevity and their mobility bone broths. And I'm pretty, I'm pretty proud of it. They have agreed to be a sponsor on our podcast. They want to try it out. I'm very attracted to their packaging. I absolutely love their packaging. It has this like foil look to it, shiny. I'm loving it. I think it's so beautiful. I think it's cardboard with a, with a shiny label. But it is very pretty and they've done a really good job. I love Fido's bone broth. It's freeze dried. They also sell a frozen fresh bone broth too. But I'm going to talk about the freeze dried bone broth. Okay. And what I love about Fidos is that their regular bone broth, the fresh bone broth is in glass, not plastic. Go Phytos. And they come in, let's see, it's digestin. Yeah, digestive. That is the beef bone broth powder. And we have added calendula chamomile, marshmallow root, BlackBerry leaf, burdock root and ginger root. So it's very balanced energetically. I mean, people have just been raving about this bone broth combination. So I'm very proud, very proud. In subsequent episodes of the podcast, I won't be bragging about it, I'll just be talking about Vito's bone broth. But this is their first sponsorship here on the podcast and it's grass fed dehydrated bone broth. They test for heavy metal, heavy metals, because bone broth can have heavy metals in them. I love that about their company. When they first reached out to me, I asked them, you know, are you going to have your heavy metal, your bone broth tested for heavy metals? And they said yes. And I was super excited about that. It helps with a balanced gut microbiome and helps with stool consistency, you know, and a stool consistency is super important for people. You know, we don't want dogs having runny poo. So that is their digestive formula. And then they have a longevity formula. And the longevity formula has turkey tail mushroom, maitake mushroom and oyster mushroom. And this is a really great blend. It's also grass fed dehydrated beef bone broth, grass fed grass finished. And that's their longevity blend. And then their mobility blend is a blend of grass fed dehydrated beef bone broth, marshmallow root, Solomon seal root, alfalfa, rose hips and ginger root. And the alfalfa is organic, it is non genetically modified. So they are not using genetically modified alfalfa. I know, I talk about that all the time. And this is for their mobility. And again, they've gotten rave reviews on this mobility formula. It's really helping a lot of dogs get more mobility and action through their musculoskeletal system. And that's why I formulated it. It's very good for, you know, healthy tissue, skin, joints, cartilage, and then they just have a plain bone broth. So that is their freeze dried line. So check them out at Fido's bottle bone broth dot com. I will be carrying those powders in my store pretty soon. In the next couple months, I'll let you know. But dehydrated, dehydrated bone broth and formulated by yours truly, Rada Hogan. 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