Three dogs, two berets and one elusive truffle in an Eagle hazelnut orchard
FINDING THE FUNGUS ISN’T EASY, D1 • SPECIAL VIDEO: GET A DOG’S-EYE VIEW OF THE TRUFFLE HUNT IDAHOSTATESMAN.COM
THE BUSINESS OF DRONES
Three Idaho companieshave plan for agriculture
Latah County jumped the gun by issuing licenseson Oct. 10, before the 9th Circuit Court of Appealslifted a stay blocking same-sex marriage in Idaho.
The Idaho Bureau of Vital Records and Health Sta-tistics invalidated the license for Tabitha Sim-mons and Katherine Sprague, above, the first cou-ple to get married, and for five other couples.
One couple said it plans to take legal action.
SAME-SEX MARRIAGE
Six Idaho licenses invalid
VARSITY EXTRA BASKETBALL
BK GIRLS WINDISTRICT TITLE
SPORTS, A10
FROZEN ZOO
SAVING ANIMALSFROM EXTINCTIONEndangered species are thatway for a reason. Freezing cellsand sperm at the San Diego Zoocould help them recover.DEPTH, D1
INSIDE TODAY “It’s bad luck to be superstitious.” ERIC CARLSON, Wake Forest professor and disbeliever in Friday the 13th lore, and joking about it NATION, A6
IdahoStatesmanFRIDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2015 60° / 38° SEE A14
M. SUNNY
$1
FBI DIRECTOR: POLICE HAVE BIASES, LIKE EVERYONE ELSE A6
Well, you could see a steamymovie, read a book on affairs ofthe heart, or just drink.
Æ “Fifty Shades of Grey” isabout to heat up theaters, but isit any good? REVIEW, 4
Æ Eagle romance author Lau-ra Lee Guhrke sits down withDana Oland. ARTS, 14
Æ Michael Deeds has thelowdown on local Valentine’sDay beers. FOOD AND DRINK, 25
ON THE WEB
5 THINGS TO DOTHIS WEEKENDCheck out Michael Deeds’weekly list of events. No. 1 is,“Remove your pants.” It isUndie Run time.IDAHOSTATESMAN.COM/ENTERTAINMENT
LAST-MINUTEPLANNING, NOT PANICNeed some urgent ideas forValentine’s Day? We’re here foryou with some worthwhile sug-gestions.IDAHOSTATESMAN.COM/LOCALNEWS
CIVICS TEST
Idaho bill would helphigh school studentsROBERT EHLERT, DEPTH, D1
THE HEIR DOWN HERE
After death, haveFacebook page liveNEWS, A7
Paul Beckman hunts for truffles in his Eagle orchard with the help of chef Franck Bacquet, right, andthree dogs, including an Australian shepherd named Abbey. Idaho’s soil and climate make it apotential production zone for truffles, Beckman says. About 20 hobbyist growers operate in the
Treasure Valley, including several neighbors of Beckman’s orchard in the Foothills.
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Their unique venture — flying drones asa service for farmers (Blair Farms, ofKendrick, to start with) — will be smallat first but could grow quickly. NEWS, A5
IN SCENE
ROMANTICWEEKEND —WHAT TO DO?
Find today’scomics, puzzles,horoscopes &
advice in SceneSCENE, 34-39
IDAHO LEGISLATURE
OPENMEETINGVIOLATIONSRep. Linden Bateman wantslarger fines for not adhering tothe law, saying big deterrentsare needed so the public won’tbe kept in the dark. His bill hasan uphill climb. NEWS, A4
The Associated PressNola, age 40, is one of only five remaining northern white rhi-nos. The white rhino and the drill monkey were the first ani-mals to have their cells stored at the Frozen Zoo.
Sen. Jim Patrick’s service onthe Idaho State Senate Educa-tion Committee has kept him
abreast of education trends andinitiatives. Patrick, a Republican,supports the Idaho Core Stan-dards. He supports a heavy influ-ence on STEM (science, technolo-gy, engineering and math) classes.But something has been gnawingat him, something he feels hasbeen lacking in the comprehen-sive education of children in Ida-ho and across the country:
More emphasis on civic educa-tion.
For that reason he introducedSB 1071 this week, which calls forhigh school students to pass acivics test before they graduate —not just any civics test, but thevery same 100-question test thatthose wishing to become U.S. citi-zens take in order to be natural-ized. Idaho high school seniors inthe 2016-2017 class would have toget 60 questions right in order topass. The requirement for 2018and beyond would be to answer70 questions correctly.
Patrick became interested inboosting civic education after hehelped an immigrant friend gaincitizenship.
“A lot of people don’t thinkabout the good form of govern-ment we have,” Patrick said. “Thisis something we all should know. ”
Such laws already exist in Ari-zona (2013) and they seem in linewith the civic education initiativesof one of that state’s favoritedaughters: former Supreme CourtJustice Sandra Day O’Connor.
Though there’s already criti-cism about Patrick’s bill — somebelieve civics is getting its due inIdaho classrooms — I can’t seethe harm in students being as wellversed about our civics test as arenew citizens. Though low voterturnout is complicated — only 38percent of eligible Idahoans votedin November (the first time itdipped below 40 percent) — weneed a multifaceted strategy to re-energize our state and countryabout civic engagement.
I hope you will familiarizeyourself with Patrick’s bill and thetest. See pages D2-3 for somequestions and answers, and seewhether you can get 8 of the 15sample questions right. Tell ushow you did. We need a civicsrenaissance.
“OK, Abbey. Is there a truffle in there?”It was a breezy February afternoon.
Paul Beckman called to one of his Aus-tralian shepherds as she stuck her nose inthe dirt at the base of a stubby hazelnuttree. Something smelled good. Abbeystarted digging, snout following paws.
Beckman dropped to all fours andpushed the persistent dog’s face out of itshole. Abbey is quick. She’s smart. She isknown to gulp down truffles — which sellfor prices more akin to cocaine than cocoa— and then play dumb.
A luckier Beckman might have rakedhis garden claw through the dirt andfound a truffle, one of the most sought-af-ter delicacies in European cuisine. Freshfrom the ground, truffles give off a power-ful aroma, earthy and garlicky in somecases and fruity in others.
A truffle is a fungus that looks more likea ball of coral than a mushroom. Sometruffle varieties command more than$1,000 a pound from chefs wanting todress up their high-dollar dishes with arare and pungent flourish.
Beckman’s claw turned up nothing.He dusted off his knees and resumed
walking rows of trees. He followed theleash pulled by the smallest of his threetruffle dogs, a 2-year-old Lagotto Romag-nolo with an Italian name meaning “beau-tiful gypsy.”
“OK, Bella Gitana,” Beckman said. “Gofind me a truffle.”
Beckman’s hit-or-mostly-miss trufflehunts started in 2007 in the Foothillsnorth of Eagle when he planted morethan 15 acres of hazelnut trees, which aresmall, easy to grow and known for pro-ducing truffles on their roots.
He was turned on to truffles the yearbefore at a class for growers at the 2008Oregon Truffle Festival in Eugene, Ore.Two researchers flew in six Perigordtruffles from Spain and passed themaround in stainless steel trays. Perigord isa region in France where the black truf-fles are still harvested.
“The aroma was so intense I had to getup and leave the room,” Beckman said.“It was crazy. You can imagine how freshtruffles shaved over food will knock yoursocks off.”
He found his first Foothills truffle fouryears ago, and about 200 since, including15 totaling a half-pound— or about $150worth — in a single hunt in January. Hetook the haul to the Oregon Truffle Festi-val, where growers shared and comparedtruffles from around the world.
Back in the orchard, Beckman, 62, a
brother of the founder of Eagle bath andbody product company Camille Beck-man, joked that he was pretending to beFrench and pointed to the black beret onhis head.
The beret was provided by FranckBacquet, a gourmet chef with a passionfor truffles who tagged along for thehunt. Bacquet hunted for truffles in hisnative France using trained pigs on leash-es. Pigs make fantastic truffle hunters,Bacquet said, but you have to be careful.They are big and strong, and after twodays without food, they really want thattruffle they smell 6 or 10 inches under-ground. You’ve got to flex your backagainst the leash to keep them from it,Bacquet said.
After moving to Boise, Bacquetopened Wine and Specialty Imports inBoise Towne Square in 2004 and later arestaurant named Le Coq Rouge (TheRed Rooster), in West Boise. Both closed.Later, he worked as executive chef at An-gell’s Bar and Grill Renato in Boise.
Eagle grower Paul Beckman courts the mysterious truffle
See TRUFFLES, D4
For love of dogs and fungus
Frozen Zoo could rescue animal life
BY JULIE WATSONTHE ASSOCIATED PRESS
ESCONDIDO, Calif. — Wheneveran endangered animal dies at the SanDiego Zoo, researchers race out, re-gardless of the hour, to remove itssperm or eggs, maybe a bit of ear oreyeball, and carefully freeze the cells inliquid nitrogen.
Today, the survival of the northernwhite rhinoceros and dozens of other
species could hinge on the collectionamassed over nearly 40 years that hasbecome the largest gene bank of itskind: The Frozen Zoo.
The icy vials may someday even beused in experiments to resurrect re-cently extinct animals, like the Hawai-ian Po’ouli bird. The stainless steeltanks hold the genetic material of morethan 10,000 individual animals frommore than 1,000 species and sub-species.
The Frozen Zoo’s work has taken onrenewed urgency since the San DiegoSafari Park lost 42-year-old Angalifu tocancer in December, leaving only fivenorthern white rhinos left in the world
— and all unable to reproduce.Scientists are racing against the
clock to find the best way to utilize thebank’s frozen sperm to produce anoth-er one before the northern white goesextinct, likely within a decade.
Critics question whether it’s worthspending millions of dollars on speciesthat are down to so few.
The bank is valued as a geneticarchive that has helped advance artifi-cial insemination, in vitro fertilization,cloning and stem cell technology. Butdebate is stirring over how far such re-search should go.
THE ROOTS OF A GOURMET MEAL
ENDANGERED SPECIES
D FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2015OBITUARIES D5 • LETTERS TO THE EDITOR D3
Inside:Opinions‘HISTORICAL RACING’ PULLS A FAST ONE D2
CAN GOP ADAPT ON EVOLUTION QUESTION? D3Depth
There are ethical debates andmonetary questions to sort out,but saving cells in liquid nitrogencould prevent extinction.
VIDEO: A DOG’S-EYE VIEW Idahostatesman.comGo truffle hunting with Bella Gitana, one of Paul Beckman’s truffle dogs,
who wore a camera for an exclusive Idaho Statesman video.
KYLE GREEN / [email protected] Beckman and Franck Bacquet have a mutual interest in truffles: Beckman is a truffle-hunting hobbyist, Bacquet a truffle-loving chef. Beckmanhopes to produce and sell enough truffles to establish an Eagle restaurant opening next summer. Bacquet will be its chef.
“The frozen zoo is basi-cally rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic,” saidPaul Ehrlich, a senior fellowat the Stanford Woods Insti-tute for the Environment atStanford University.
He noted the world needsto address the problem’sroot causes, such as popula-tion growth and climatechange.
“Screwing around withscience to save a white rhinomight be fun and I wouldlike to see it preserved andam all for biodiversity, butit’s so far down the list ofthings we should be doingfirst,” he said.
With species going ex-tinct at a faster rate, zoos aretaking on greater conserva-
tion roles and facing decid-ing which animals are worthfocusing efforts on saving.Some may be extinct by thetime another one is repro-duced and possibly neverlive in the wild.
The northern white’s nat-ural habitat is in war-torncountries like Sudan andCongo, which have been un-able to stop poachers. Thehorn is coveted in Asia as anaphrodisiac, creating a mar-ket that threatens all rhinospecies.
There’s also the hurdle ofproducing enough offspringto avoid inbreeding.
“We can do all kinds ofrazzle dazzle things but it’sone thing to make anotheranimal or two or three, butit’s quite another to make asustainable population froma genetic standpoint,” saidGeorge Seidel, a Colorado
State University professorwho has written about res-urrecting the woolly mam-moth.
The challenges, however,are not insurmountable forcritically endangeredspecies or possibly recentlyextinct species, said BarbaraDurrant, director of repro-ductive physiology at TheSan Diego Zoo Institute forConservation Research,which houses the Frozen
Zoo.“We’re not so much inter-
ested in bringing back di-nosaurs or mammoths,” shesaid. “There’s really no placefor them now.”
The Frozen Zoo holds thecell cultures from 12 north-ern white rhinos — morethan the living population:“There have been otherspecies that have come backfrom numbers that small sowe think there is good rea-
son we can do this with thenorthern white rhino,” shesaid.
Sperm from the FrozenZoo has been used in artifi-cial insemination to repro-duce endangered animalsfrom the giant panda to theChinese monal pheasant. Itsfrozen cells also were usedto clone two endangeredtypes of cattle. The gaurlived only a few days whilethe banteng survived forseven years before being putdown after breaking a leg.Both animals, however, hadgenetic defects.
The northern white rhinoand the drill monkey werethe first endangered animalsto have their cells trans-formed into stem cells andstored at the Frozen Zoo.
Theoretically stem cellscan produce any body tissue.That means thawed stem
cells from a male rhinocould produce both spermand egg in the lab, but themethod has been done onlyonce — in a mouse.
Artificial inseminationhas seen success in produc-ing other rhino species.Northern white rhino semencould be used to impregnatethe closely related southernwhite to make a hybrid.
Scientists are also lookingat in vitro fertilization butthat technique has neverbeen done on any rhinospecies.
On a recent day, the onlynorthern white left in theUnited States, 40-year-oldNola, munched on apples atthe San Diego Safari Park.When she dies, there is talkof placing her in the Smith-sonian so future generationscan see a northern white rhi-no.
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Bacquet said he will bethe executive chef of a gour-met restaurant now beingbuilt in Eagle, Le Coq d’Or(The Blind Rooster), whichis expected to open thissummer. Beckman is theconstruction manager of a21,000-square-foot meetingcenter and event venue,named Le Chateau DesFleurs, that will include therestaurant.
Restaurant dishes toppedwith 10 to 15 grams of trufflesstart around $40, Bacquetsaid. The trick is to shave thetruffle over the dish as itnears completion to avoidcooking out the aroma andflavor of the fungus.
“Eggs with truffles is thebest,” Bacquet said in aheavy French accent. “Sim-ple. Traditional.”
The dogs sniffed downanother row of hazelnuttrees.
“What’s that, Ellie?” Beck-man asked his suddenly ex-cited cattle dog. “Is it a truf-fle? Nope. Quail crap.”
Ellie, the darker Aus-tralian shepherd, feigned in-terest in the hunt after 20minutes. Any breed canlearn to hunt truffles, Beck-man said, including 8-year-old shepherd sisters. ButAbbey loves truffles. She’dgobble down her food withtruffle sprinklings, part ofBeckman’s training to tunethe dogs’ noses to the trufflefrequency. Then she’d gob-ble food from the bowl offthe disinterested Ellie.
Abbey has found about200 truffles, Beckman said.Ellie has found one.
With the shepherds tiringmore quickly as they age,Beckman hopes Bella Gitanaturns out like her Italian an-cestors famous for trufflehunting. The small dog withcurly, soft hair and greatstamina cost him $3,000.
Bella Gitana sniffed thebase of each tree while theshepherds went through themotions. She was excited.
But still, no truffles.At the 2008 Oregon festi-
val, Beckman sidled up toTom Michaels, a fungiexpert and one of a handfulof full-time truffle farmers in
the United States. Michaelsresearched truffles for hisPh.D. dissertation at OregonState University and devel-oped mushroom-growingtechniques for Dole Foodsand Monterey MushroomsInc. He then started his owntruffles orchard near theBlue Ridge Mountains inTennessee. He’s Doctor Fun-gi.
Beckman pepperedMichaels with questions.
The pair hit it off. Michaelsbecame Beckman’s friendand truffle mentor. The pairswapped tips and stories,many with a recurringtheme:
Nobody really knowsmuch about growing truf-fles.
Truffle knowledge isstuck where the button-mushroom industry was 200years ago, Michaels told theStatesman. Then, pickerswere happy to scour a pas-ture for a basket of buttons,the common mushroomsfound in salads and on pizza.Today, U.S. button-mush-room farmers average 7pounds of crop per squarefoot in three months.
But truffle farmers arestill happy to fill that singlebasket, he said.
“We all think we’re livingin the great age of the 21stcentury and we understandeverything,” Michaels said.“But with the truffle, we’reback in deep soup.”
Truffle growing is a faith-based exercise, Beckmansaid. He has put to workwhat science knows. Histrees are inoculated withtruffle spores. His orchardhas the loose, high-pH soilthat seems ideal for trufflesto multiply and grow on treeroots.
Biologists can geneticallymodify apples and potatoesto enhance their color orhardiness or yield. But theydon’t know what levels ofthe most basic nutrients —nitrogen, potassium andphosphorous — make truf-fles happy, Michaels said.
“I plant the tree and hopeit works,” Beckman said.“Even if it does, I don’t knowwhy.”
The wind picked up, andthe last remnants of sunslipped behind the clouds.Having traversed the or-chard, Beckman decided tomake one more run at theorchard’s most productivecorner before calling it a day.
Abbey had signaled she’dfound truffles in severalspots earlier, but her digscame up empty. Beckmanrallied her remaining enthu-siasm for another pass.
Something smelled goodenough to perk her up again.
Abbey thrust her nose in-to the dirt. She got excited.She dug as Beckmancheered her on, pawspicking up speed. Then
Beckman again pushed thedetermined dog’s head outof the hole.
This time, Beckman’s gar-den claw emerged with anItalian spring Bianchettowhite truffle. It was roundand knobby, covered in dirt,the size of a ping pong ball. Itsmelled of spice and earth.
At 15 grams, tops, the truf-fle wasn’t going to makeBeckman rich. But it wasbetter than going homeempty-handed. He grinnedand handed his prize to Bac-quet. Bacquet pressed thetruffle to his nose. If a nodcould somehow lookFrench, Bacquet achieved it.
“This is a good one,” hesaid.
Beckman’s smile widenedas he took his turn breathingin the truffle’s musky, richaroma. If he had found more,he would have shipped themovernight to restaurants.This little truffle wasn’t go-ing anywhere.
“I’ll have eggs tomorrow!”Beckman said. “Not many.”
Zach Kyle: 377-6464,@IDS_zachkyle
TRUFFLESCONTINUED FROM D1
Photos by KYLE GREEN / [email protected] shepherds, such as sisters Abbey, left, and Ellie, aren’t considered a specialized breed for truffle hunting. Any breedcan be trained to be a successful truffle hunter, says the dogs’ owner, Paul Beckman.
“You don’t buy Viagra.You buy truffles.”
CHEF FRANCK BACQUET, who says trufflesare among the strongest aphrodisiacs
Grower Paul Beckman shows off a sliced-open truffle. Truffles are best served in simple disheswith fat to absorb the aroma, chef Franck Bacquet said. Beckman’s favorites are truffle-infusedcream puffs. He says pastas and vanilla ice cream are superb with truffles shaved over the top.
“It’s like hunting for Easter eggs. I enjoyedit as a kid. I enjoy it as an adult.”
PAUL BECKMAN, who said he views truffle growingas a hobby but would embrace the unlikely event
that his orchard became a full-time job.
FROZEN ZOOCONTINUED FROM D1
The Associated PressBarbara Durant, director of reproductive physiology at the San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation Research (Frozen Zoo),stands on the rail of a nitrogen-cooled stainless steel vat holding hundreds of vials of animal cells.
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