Intro 0:00
Welcome to the Naturally Healthy Pets podcast. Let's get to it.
Dr. Judy Morgan
Hello everyone. Welcome to the Naturally Healthy Pets podcast. I'm your host Dr Judy Morgan. My guest today is Julie Ann Lee. She is the founder and co owner of the Adored Beast Apothecary, where she formulates holistic pet care products. She is also a pioneer in studying the animal microbiome and developing protocols for optimizing gut health, all part of a rapidly expanding picture and understanding of the crucial role the microbiome plays in the health of all of our animals and ourselves. She's also part of a research and development team examining, producing and formulating unique first in the industry species specific probiotics and functional prebiotics for animals.
Dr. Judy Morgan 0:47
Currently, Julie is in her fourth year of an extensive research project on canine cancer at Dalhousie University, and is doing research and development with her medicinal her medical mushroom forest in Nova Scotia, Canada, called Myco-Biome. Julie lives in Nova Scotia, Canada, on her rescue farm, Joseph's Field. I love it. She shares her home and farm with numerous dogs, cats, horses, donkeys, cows, chickens, one legged ducks, a blind pot bellied pig and a ball python named Bob, all of whom came to Julie as a last resort, chronically ill or abused and who are now living their best lives at their forever home. It's so cool doing the rescue animal, especially the farm animal work. I love it. So welcome, Julie. Thanks. Thank you so much for agreeing to come on and teach us today.
Julie Anne Lee
I love coming on.
Dr. Judy Morgan 1:40
We do chat a lot, which I was like, didn't I just talk to her?
Dr. Judy Morgan 1:46
But it's always, always fun conversation. So today we want to talk about forest fungi. We're going to talk about that forest that you go out and play around in, and the magnificent world of medical mushrooms, which this, this is fairly new, I would say in the last five years, maybe 10. I mean, I remember in practice many years ago when University of Pennsylvania did the first Turkey Tail studies for hemangiosarcoma, and they had really good results.
Dr. Judy Morgan 2:20
So I started prescribing, or recommending medicinal mushrooms, many, many, many years ago, but I feel like in about the past five years or so, it's actually become a little more mainstream, a little more talked about. And I just have to say, my dog with cancer, with his bladder cancer, I have him on like, six different mushroom tinctures and powders and chews and stuff, because I'm of the belief that you I don't think you can kill them with mushrooms, and I cannot monitor his bladder cancer without going and getting an ultrasound. But he also had a soft tissue sarcoma on the side of his chest, which, since he's been on this protocol, that thing is probably a quarter the size that it was, and it's really soft and mushy. And I feel like, if that's what I can feel on the outside, there's got to be good stuff happening on the inside as well.
Julie Anne Lee
100% 100% I agree with you.
Dr. Judy Morgan 3:21
So you've been using medicinal mushrooms in your practice for probably 25 years, which is a lot longer, because I don't think, I don't know when that study from Penn came out, but I don't think I was using it for more than six or seven years in practice, maybe.
Dr. Judy Morgan 3:40
12. Okay, that would have been about right then, all right, yeah. So, so your mind works a little bit differently than everybody else's, when we're talking about medicinal mushrooms. So can you tell us about that your your mind, first of all, is brilliant and always working. And I'm, I'm in awe.
Julie Anne Lee 3:57
It's different, for sure. I don't know about awe, but yeah, so I, when I had my vet practices in in Vancouver, I want I actually was very lucky, and I got to work with a traditional Chinese medicine doctor, and he worked with me for two and a half years in my vet clinic, and I was introduced to him by a really wonderful veterinarian in in Vancouver. And so when he came in, he was a human, an MD, but in China, you are required to to learn about animals. Because if you if someone comes in with an animal, they still have such an old code that a medical doctor is still required to to do what they can for an animal. So cool, so interesting. But anyways,
Dr. Judy Morgan 4:54
that is very cool. I didn't know that.
Julie Anne Lee
Yeah, it's very, very old. It's a it's an ancient thing.
Julie Anne Lee 5:00
So his father was a TCM, and his father before that. So it's really long lineage. And when he came he taught me about medicinal mushrooms, like in 1997
Julie Anne Lee 5:14
from a perspective that I still haven't seen anyone do, which is sort of like the signature of the plant or the signature of the mushroom. So he would look at different mushrooms and what they look like, and say to me, okay, this is the spirit of the mushroom. This is what that mushroom looks like. Look at this tumor. And then look at this mushroom, and look how much they look alike, and look at the like he it was. It was incredible, phenomenal. He had all the science behind it with the, you know, polyphenols and the beta glucans, the triterpenes and all that stuff. But, but he more focused on matching the the energy of the mushroom to the energy of the tumor, the energy of the cancer. So I was really lucky to work with this man, and I was using medicinal mushrooms in my in my hospital for everything, like autoimmune diseases and different types of tumors and cancers, a lot of in a lot of different ones. Like, seriously, like, if you look at a mushroom and you are in the forest, and you see something that's dead or decayed or whatever, and you watch that mushroom, that mushroom envelops and becomes that dead, decayed thing and then consumes it, and it becomes a mushroom. It's almost like it's this transformation of something that is diseased or dead becomes a mushroom like it's, it's quite fascinating. So when you for me, I always, I mean, I'm a science nerd, but I, but I, but I really pay attention to what things happen and what, what, what does. How is it working in nature, not just what's it look like under a microscope? Because unfortunately, when we're just looking at stuff like that, it's, it's a moment in time. You know when, when you look at blood work, or you look at mushrooms, or you look at, you look at a cell, or you look at whatever, you know, a fecal analysis and looking at bacteria to try to figure out what kind of microbiome is in it. It's like, it's like a snapshot in time. It's not, it's not something that we know has happened before, and we don't know what's going to happen, right? Whereas, when you look at nature and you and you, you can see, oh my gosh, this is what was happening before. This is what they did to do this. And now this is happening, right? Like, you can see a much higher level perspective of how things work in nature.
Julie Anne Lee 7:45
So I've been fascinated with mushrooms and that for a very long time.
Julie Anne Lee 7:53
But then, then I, you know, I really, really delved into the microbiome and bacteria in general. So not just, not just like, not just gut microbiome, but microbiome in the soil, microbiome in on our skin, microbiome like, like bacteria, right? And, and when people hear the word bacteria, they get often, get scared, right? Oh, it's bacteria. Meanwhile, bacteria is probably one of the most important, right?
Dr. Judy Morgan
Oh, that's bad. We need. We need to kill that
Julie Anne Lee
exactly. So when I, Adored Beast decided to produce a mushroom line. Like usual. I'm like, Okay, I want something different. I want. I don't seem to be able to find the mushrooms I want in order to produce what I want. So let's you know I have big my I always say how Dione is the most amazing partner, business partner in the world. And I'm like, Dione, I want to do this. So he was supportive. So I went out and I bought 100 acres of a forest, and
the concept and it took me forever to find this forest because I wanted to try to find an old growth,
Julie Anne Lee 9:05
a forest that had selective logging, and then a forest that had been clear cut, right? So I wanted to, I wanted to look at how mushrooms evolved in society, because that's what's happening with us and our pets. We have to evolve with pollution. We've got to evolve with climate change. We have to we have to be resilient and evolve. So I was like, I want to see what mushrooms are doing in this evolution of what they're living in, right? So that's what I did. I finally found one that had all three, which was incredible, and so we purchased it. It's amazing. It took a long time, but it is amazing, and it's actually not far from me, which is even more amazing because I was looking everywhere else, and it's like, right under my nose, and
Julie Anne Lee 9:57
but why? It's called Myco-Biome is because my philosophy is, I think, think things do better, thrive more, become resilient and become more educated in bacteria. I think bacteria is a very strong piece of knowledge, saying that I love everybody else's mushrooms like I don't, I don't. I'm not saying, oh, mushrooms that are grown in a sterile environment, very scientifically, making sure that everything is the same all every single time. I'm not saying that's bad, not even remotely. It's incredible. There's lots of science behind it. It is. It's amazing. But like you said, I'm really outside the box and, and, and there's all kinds of people doing those mushrooms and, and they're great. So mine was like, I want to see what mushrooms do when they're
Julie Anne Lee 10:55
living in their environment from a medicinal perspective, right? I want to see them with my eyeballs, what they're doing. I want to see what, you know, what does this mushroom grow at this time? What impacts it from an environmental perspective? And then we do all of this testing, and we're also the whole forest. Literally looks like little templates through the whole forest, because we're allowing the forest to teach us how does Lion's Mane live? You know, we have all of these books saying, This is what Lion's Mane needs. This is what Turkey Tail needs. Well, when you do them in the forest, that all goes out the window, it's like, no, no, no, no, no. That's not what we would need. We need this. And no, no, no, no, we're not going to grow and fruit now we're going to grow and fruit When we say we're going to go from grown fruit. So we're compiling all of this really cool information, and then what I do is I look at this information and go, how does that compare to environmental allergies. How does that compare to seasonal allergies? How does that compare? What's evolving? Why? How are they evolving? And how are they how are they creating this amazing medicinal aspect in that environment? And then what I try to do is go, Okay, how does that compare to all these different diseases, whether they're people, whatever, and then,
Julie Anne Lee 12:25
and then produce things based on that. So it's called Myco-Biome Myco, because of mycology, mushrooms, and then biome for the forest bed and the bacteria that's in the logs and in the water and in the soil, and when deer poop around them, and when squirrels come in, chew half of them and then go over there, like, what? What is the educational piece that they're getting from the bacteria in the forest? So that's the whole concept of Myco-Biome, and it's the concept of my formulas.
Julie Anne Lee 12:58
It's different. It's definitely different than
Dr. Judy Morgan
which this is it is, and it's very cool because it's we do have external factors that are going to make a lot of variation. And it's very interesting to look at it kind of doing its own thing and not telling it what to do. We need to take a break to hear from our sponsors. We'll be right back in just a couple of minutes.
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Dr. Judy Morgan 14:31
Welcome back to the Naturally Healthy Pets podcast. I'm your host, Dr Judy Morgan, and my guest today is Julie Anne Lee, and we are discussing medicinal mushrooms and how Julie Anne's brain works a lot differently from a lot of people, but I love the Myco-Biome forest, so my question is, how often are you out traipsing around that forest, seeing what's going on?
Julie Anne Lee 14:58
Well, probably a couple times a week.
Julie Anne Lee 15:00
I have some a really good team in there right now. And usually what happens is, I'll get a text and and they'll be like,
Julie Anne Lee 15:12
Oh my gosh, you gotta come see these Reishi. It's like, we didn't even know they were here. We didn't know that this is happening. They weren't supposed to they weren't supposed to fruit now, and they're like, the size of our heads. So, you know, I jump in my truck and I bombed down and put my rubber boots on and go in and take pictures. And go, Okay, why did this happen? And let's document this. And what, you know, what, whatever. So I'm down there quite a bit. I'm definitely part of the high level, like, We're doing everything, just like I said. We, we, we're doing all kinds of different, different I'm going to call them plantings, but where you inoculate them and then,
Julie Anne Lee 15:51
you know, we're planting them in the we're actually inoculating them and putting the logs in the ground. We're taking, we're taking spores and injecting them into the clear cut part of the forest in into the stumps, right into the things that people are like, Okay, well, this forest is worth nothing now, right? So it's like, no, no. This forest needs to be rewild. And part of that rewilding is mushrooms and and so on and so forth. So my, my idea, and my, my work at Dalhousie right now is looking at everything that I'm using is natural and wild crafted, like the mushrooms that I'm doing the cancer project with. And it's, you know, we're I'm looking this. The cells that I'm looking on looking at right now are lymphosarcoma, osteosarcoma, breast cell cancers, liver cell cancer, and,
Julie Anne Lee 16:43
that's it, for support for right now, and we're, I'm in my fourth year, and we're going into the next stage of working with the University and actually doing live studies on on dogs. So it's, it's really interesting. It's, it, yeah, it's, it's quite phenomenal. But, you know, in Japan,
Dr. Judy Morgan
so are you, are you harvesting, are you harvesting these mushrooms?
Julie Anne Lee
Yeah, we're harvesting them. So right now, what we're doing is, and this is the long term goal. There's a big, there's a lot big, long term goals of this, of course, because it's me, but I don't do anything without trying to give back to the environment. And that's a really big part of Myco-Biome that people really should know about, and that is, you know, ever since I was a I was moved to BC, I remember I moved in 1994 to go to UBC, and it was the first time I ever saw a clear cut up on the mountain. And I literally had to pull over because I felt like I was going to be sick because I never I was really ignorant and naive. I had no idea what was even happening. So I when I started doing Myco-Biome I also have this intention. Is that I live in Nova Scotia, and I live in an area that is very diverse in culture, from a perspective of not having a lot of money, a very a lot of poverty. But then a lot of you know it. You know a lot of people that are what doesn't matter, like it's all over the place, from a social, economic perspective. And a lot of people sell their these beautiful forests because it's been passed down to them in in generations, right? It was their great, great grandfathers. But they don't, aren't doing anything with them. So the big logging companies come in and they say, Oh, well, you can still keep your property, but we're just going to take your trees. And it sounds nice and cool and it sounds good to begin with, until you look at it and it looks like an atomic bomb just went in and completely destroyed your forest, and then you do nothing with it. And then they monoculture it, right? So they plant the same trees that are all pine trees, which are to me. I call them like little, you know,
Julie Anne Lee 18:59
you know, like fire starters, because they they, if they catch on fire, you know, with all these wildfires, when a when a when a forest that's that's all pine trees, they've got creosote from top all the way down to the ground. So the forests take off faster, like the fires are harder to contain, because there's no deciduous trees, and there's no shrubberies that are wet and more moist and don't float around and don't have creosote in them. So my goal for this is, I'm trying to say this really fast, is that I we're going to put a template together once we once we have all of our documentation, we're going to put a template together that creates that I can go to anybody and say, instead of cutting down your forest, here's the template. If you follow this template, I will purchase every single mushroom that you grow. You don't even have to have a business. Or we'll bring in our team, and you can make money on these Mushrooms.
Julie Anne Lee 20:00
So my goal is to show people that that a forest is worth more than pulp and paper, that that herbs and medicinal mushrooms and all the things that we can harvest environmentally friendly from a forest is incredible. Like it really is incredible. And it is it you can make money, you know, doing it.
Dr. Judy Morgan
This is amazing. So this is, this is not just about having a business of making mushroom extracts. You Your heart has you in a place where, yes, this is a business, but this is how we can give back to the planet, to the environment, to the people who are the guardians of those forests. And that is so amazing, because people, people don't know what to do. It's like, okay, well, because when we were looking for land for our farm, I was like, Well, I don't want a big old forest. I need pastures for animals. I need, you know, something different. And we found what I consider the perfect piece of property. It's 23 acres, about 16 or 17 is cleared in the middle, and then it has trees ringing around, you know, and it's a mix of forest all the way around the property. So we're very private. Even though we only have 23 acres, it's very private. We have the pasture land, but we also have that forest, and I'm so all about it, like I heard a neighbor over there knocking down trees the other day, and I was like, oh, please tell me we have a big enough buffer that we're not gonna have have this big empty space with no trees. So that is so so cool. That is a big goal. How long do you think it's going to take for that to happen?
Julie Anne Lee 21:55
Well, I think, I think I did a, I actually was a lecturer for a mycology conference, and I put it out there to people just saying that this was my goal. And I can't tell you how many people, even in the mushroom industry, have reached out to me and said, you know, any way we can help you. We think this is an amazing, amazing, you know, a large undertaking.
Julie Anne Lee 22:16
You know, any way we can help you, I think we've had the forest for three years now,
Julie Anne Lee 22:22
I would say that we'll probably have enough data in by seven years to move this forward with other people. And the cool thing is, as we're doing it in different sections. So I could come to you, if you only have five acres, and say, okay, Judy, you know what here is. Here's the plan, and you can do it on five acres. You don't have to have 100 acres. You could do it on two acres. It doesn't it really doesn't matter. We're trying to make it really doable for as many people as we can. So, but, you know, getting back to the mushrooms themselves, again, I'm a mushroom freak. I have been for a very long time and, you know, but I, you know, and I'm definitely not saying that these mushrooms are the best, or these mushrooms are, you know, this is the way to go, because, you know, for me, it's diversity, and it's also energy, right? Like, I'm a big energy person, like my, my vet hospital is one of the, yeah, we were full integrative Veterinary Clinic surgery, the whole nine yards. But my main, my main focus, was energy and homeopathy, and, you know, doing Reiki when they came out of surgery. And, like, I'm a very energetic person. So that was the other thing that I felt. I feel like, I feel like plants and mushrooms, especially mushrooms, but plant, all plants, they have energy, right? So how, what's, what's their energy and the way they're growing? So what, you know, it just it, just it fits with my philosophy. But let's say you came to me with a dog, and your dog was my patient, and you came to me, and this happened to me in BC a lot, because a lot of my patients, people were really, you know, they were my patients, but my my clients, with their patient, my patients, they would come to me and they were like, stock brokers and doctors and like, I had, you know, herbalists, and I had all a very diverse clientele, and some people, they feel more comfortable with science. They feel more comfortable so if, if you're going to give your if your comfort level and your belief system is things being sterile, things being science based, things being all of that, if that's your comfort level, then that is what you should be probably giving your animals, because it's your energy as well, right? And it's your belief system, and it's your faith in in how that's going to respond to your animal.
Unknown Speaker 25:00
And I think that's why the world is becoming too compartmentalized. Oh, well, I'm, I want bacteria in my mushrooms or in my soil, but I, but you're wrong, because you want this or, you know, I'm, you know, because I wasn't trained as a conventional vet, then I don't get to play in the sandbox with everybody else, or because you're over here, then it doesn't matter, right? Like we all, I really feel like that. It's that diversity that creates that whole serendipitous thing of us all supporting each other and with the one same goal is to help the planet and help animals and help people,
Dr. Judy Morgan 25:49
absolutely, absolutely.
Julie Anne Lee 25:56
So that's what Myco-Biome is about.
Dr. Judy Morgan 25:59
This is, this is amazing. Myco-Biome is amazing. Your company is amazing. Adored Beast. and we are out of time, which it blows me away, whatever. Whenever I spend time with you, it's like goes like that.
Dr. Judy Morgan 26:12
But you are offering an ebook which is amazing, and it's called forest fungi, the magnificent world of medicinal mushrooms, which we'll have the links in the show notes for that. And I that is a great offer. I think more people need to understand medicinal mushrooms. In my world, I I'm always saying to my husband, can we have mushrooms for dinner?
Dr. Judy Morgan 26:36
And all of my dogs, no matter they're sick or healthy, they're they're all getting mushroom supplements and eating mushrooms, because I just feel like they're good for prevention, they're good for gut health, they're just good for so many things. So we appreciate all the I really appreciate all the work that you're doing, because as a researcher, you have to be willing to look seven years out, 10 years out, 20 years out, and I'm more of an instant gratification person, which is why I don't do research, because, man, I would be sleepless all the time going, Why can't this go faster? So Julie Anne, thank you so much for all the work that you're doing. I'm sure we will be chatting soon, and we all really appreciate you.
Julie Anne Lee
Well, I really appreciate you too, and I feel the same way. if I'm doing a podcast. I do a lot of podcasts, but if I'm doing one with you, it's like, oh, it's Judy's podcast. I'm so excited.
Dr. Judy Morgan 27:30
Thank you very, very much.
Outro
Thanks for listening to another great Naturally Healthy Pets episode. Be sure to check out the show notes for some helpful links. And if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. We value your feedback and we'd love to hear from you on how we're doing. Visit DrJudyMorgan.com for healthy product recommendations, comprehensive courses, upcoming events and other fantastic resources. Until next time, keep giving your pet the vibrant life they deserve.
DISCLAIMER
The purpose of this podcast is to educate and to inform. It is no substitute for professional care by a veterinarian, licensed nutritionist or other qualified professional. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Dr. Judy and her guests express their own views, experience and conclusions. Dr. Judy Morgan's Naturally Healthy Pets neither endorses or opposes any particular view discussed here.
