Dangers
There are numerous other species of Bryoria that can be mistaken for wila, as they all look superficially similar. Although wila is edible, most of the other species of Bryoria are mildly toxic and should not be eaten in large quantities. Furthermore, in certain areas wila can contain toxic quantities of vulpinic acid, which is one of the most potent poisons found in lichens. If you intend to eat wila, you must take proper care to ensure that you are collecting the right species, and that it is not a morphotype that is high in vulpinic acid.
Read more about this topic: Wila (lichen)
Famous quotes containing the word dangers:
“We are willing enough to praise freedom when she is safely tucked away in the past and cannot be a nuisance. In the present, amidst dangers whose outcome we cannot foresee, we get nervous about her, and admit censorship.”
—E.M. (Edward Morgan)
“The chief reason warfare is still with us is neither a secret death-wish of the human species, nor an irrepressible instinct of aggression, nor, finally and more plausibly, the serious economic and social dangers inherent in disarmament, but the simple fact that no substitute for this final arbiter in international affairs has yet appeared on the political scene.”
—Hannah Arendt (1906–1975)
“There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one’s own safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind.... Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn’t, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn’t have to; but if he didn’t want to he was sane and had to.”
—Joseph Heller (b. 1923)