brainticket
Greenlighter
- Joined
- Apr 23, 2012
- Messages
- 8
I hope this is considered HR..
I looked back through my notes and discovered that I actually grew this from mycelium, not spores.
During season
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Find some properly identified, overly mature, scungy mushrooms in the wild that are not good to eat so as not to waste good mushrooms. They may be maggot infested or half snail eaten, etc. Doesn't really matter. If there are spores caked on the surrounding vegetation then grab those too. When picking those mushrooms grab them right to the bottom and even pick up a piece of the wood chips/bark that it is growing on. There should be a bit of mycelium on there. Please don't do this when picking mushrooms in general and only do this sparingly because you don't want to disturb the mycelium if you can avoid it.
Make a mixture of half brown rice flour, half vermiculite in a plastic take away container. Add boiling water and mix. Let cool and add the bottom of one of your mushroom stems and any spores covered leaves, mycelium covered wood chips/bark you found. I didn't really worry about sterility that much other than adding boiling water to the flour/vermiculite mixture. Put the lid on the take away container and place somewhere where there isn't too much light and where it is a moderate temperature (say 10-15 degrees C). Maybe in the cupboard in a cooler room of the house.
Check about every week and water to keep it moist. I would occasionally get some pink moldy spots growing but didn't really worry about it too much.
Within a week or two mycelium will cover the entire container. Obtain a plastic shopping bag and half fill with wet pine chips. Dump the contents of the take away container into it. Shake it around a bit then tie it closed and leave in the same conditions. Soon enough the mycelium will be throughout the chips.
Obtain foam fruit/veg box. Half fill foam box with potting mix. Cover with your special pine bark and add some organic fertilizer (mycelium goes NUTS with organic fertilizer). Plant one or two grassy plants like mondo grass in the box too - I've noticed that fruit tends to pop up around these sorts of grasses.
Over the next 6-9 months
========================
Fertilise occasionally and add dead leaves, sticks and any other dried mushrooms that you went to eat but visually fail the John West test (I'm not saying unidentified ones, just ones that were a bit too snail eated or just didn't look appetising). Keep moist. The mycelium may not be visible at all during the warmer months. Don't throw your foam box out even if it looks like a failure - no matter how weird your household thinks you are for keeping that 'stupid foam ecosystem with stupid mondo grass' around.
The following season
====================
Be surprised when even though your regular spots haven't shown results early in the season a check on your foam box results in some nice small Subs! Remember to properly identify the ones you grew yourself.
I looked back through my notes and discovered that I actually grew this from mycelium, not spores.
During season
=============
Find some properly identified, overly mature, scungy mushrooms in the wild that are not good to eat so as not to waste good mushrooms. They may be maggot infested or half snail eaten, etc. Doesn't really matter. If there are spores caked on the surrounding vegetation then grab those too. When picking those mushrooms grab them right to the bottom and even pick up a piece of the wood chips/bark that it is growing on. There should be a bit of mycelium on there. Please don't do this when picking mushrooms in general and only do this sparingly because you don't want to disturb the mycelium if you can avoid it.
Make a mixture of half brown rice flour, half vermiculite in a plastic take away container. Add boiling water and mix. Let cool and add the bottom of one of your mushroom stems and any spores covered leaves, mycelium covered wood chips/bark you found. I didn't really worry about sterility that much other than adding boiling water to the flour/vermiculite mixture. Put the lid on the take away container and place somewhere where there isn't too much light and where it is a moderate temperature (say 10-15 degrees C). Maybe in the cupboard in a cooler room of the house.
Check about every week and water to keep it moist. I would occasionally get some pink moldy spots growing but didn't really worry about it too much.
Within a week or two mycelium will cover the entire container. Obtain a plastic shopping bag and half fill with wet pine chips. Dump the contents of the take away container into it. Shake it around a bit then tie it closed and leave in the same conditions. Soon enough the mycelium will be throughout the chips.
Obtain foam fruit/veg box. Half fill foam box with potting mix. Cover with your special pine bark and add some organic fertilizer (mycelium goes NUTS with organic fertilizer). Plant one or two grassy plants like mondo grass in the box too - I've noticed that fruit tends to pop up around these sorts of grasses.
Over the next 6-9 months
========================
Fertilise occasionally and add dead leaves, sticks and any other dried mushrooms that you went to eat but visually fail the John West test (I'm not saying unidentified ones, just ones that were a bit too snail eated or just didn't look appetising). Keep moist. The mycelium may not be visible at all during the warmer months. Don't throw your foam box out even if it looks like a failure - no matter how weird your household thinks you are for keeping that 'stupid foam ecosystem with stupid mondo grass' around.
The following season
====================
Be surprised when even though your regular spots haven't shown results early in the season a check on your foam box results in some nice small Subs! Remember to properly identify the ones you grew yourself.
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