Red Belted Conk has the latin name Fomitopsis pinicola. Native people often would carry this mushroom to help light fires and I have personally experienced this when my friend tried to dry some of the polypore in the oven and it caught on fire. It is called red belted conk because it often carries a reddish ring on the outside. Juvenile RBCs look fleshy with a lot of white while older conks appear grey and are quite hard. Like other polypores, it carries innumerable tubules on the underside which emit spores in the early fall for reproduction. Unlike other annual mushrooms such as the local Reishi (Ganoderma oregonense), Red Belted Conk is a perennial that can persist for decades. For that reason we should be cautious about its overharvest. Even though it is often quite abundant in a Hemlock forest, it plays an important role in providing habitat for small woodland creatures and food for insects and small creatures. One RBC can be enough medicine for years for one person.
Properties: Styptic, Immunomodulatory, Anti-tumoral, stomachic, hepatic detoxifier, anti-microbial, anti-inflammatory, anti-diabetic, anti-histaminic, circulatory stimulant, emetic in high doses
Actions: Regulates blood sugar, improves immune system function, helpful for rheumatoid arthritis, improves digestive function, absorption and elimination, improves hepatic function, reduces systemic inflammation, reduces menstrual cramping and pain, reduces digestive inflammation/ulcers, increases neutrophil count, systemic tonic, reduces headaches, anti-tumoral, stops bleeding for topical wounds, traditional for fevers and chills.
The antidiabetic effect of different doses of water extract (WE) and ethanol extract (EE) was tested on a high-fat diet and streptozotocin (STZ) induced diabetic rats. Parameters were evaluated with normal control (NC), diabetes mellitus control (DM), and metformin (M) groups. In the experiment, nine groups were used with eight rats in each group and three doses of each WE and EE were used, with low, medium, and high doses. The results revealed that the DM group lost a significant amount of weight, whereas the NC group's weight increased throughout the experiment. After treatment with Fomitopsis pinicola, the EE group's weight increased gradually. Liver, kidney, and pancreas weight decreased after STZ injection and returned to normal in EE treated groups. Fasting blood glucose (FBG) levels were observed to be significantly lower after F. pinicola treatment. Serum insulin levels were also restored to normal after mushroom extracts supplementation. Specifically, STZ-induced hyperglycemia was inhibited by high dose EE administration. The biochemical analysis revealed that high-dose EE treatment increased HDL-C and decreased TC, TG, and LDL-C. Results demonstrated that high-dose EE administration protected the organ tissues from oxidative stress by normalizing the antioxidant levels, and CAT, SOD, and GSH-Px suppressed the lethal effect of MDA. The study concluded that F. pinicola EE at the dose 300 mg/kg has a more hypoglycemic, hyperinsulinemic, antioxidant, and antihyperlipidemic effect than NC, DM, and M, and regulates hyperglycemia by increasing insulin secretion.
