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Growing Oyster Mushroom can be an involved process. So, this is just an overview. More
detailed posts on the whole process will follow soon. Oyster mushrooms are the easiest of all
mushrooms to grow, so we'll focus on them.
There is a learning curve involved with mushroom growing. However, the post-shift climate will
be the perfect environment for them to thrive in.
Knowing how to grow mushrooms should be useful during the first couple of years when your
vegetables may not produce significant yields. This is especially true for those who may not be in
the direct vicinity of volcanoes but still find their presence making for much gloomier skies than
other parts of the world.
Once the mushroom spores are given a humid environment to grow in, they transform into
cotton thread structures called mycelium.
This is what the growth cycle of a mushroom looks like ------->
The mycelium is the equivalent to a plants roots. It spreads out digesting what it can (mainly
fibre), and then fruits mushrooms when the conditions are right.
A mushroom is actually made out of the same cells that form its mycelium.
If a small piece of mushroom or mycelium is cut and placed in a humid environment it will
sprout more mycelium and produce mushrooms. This is the equivalent of cutting a stem from a
plant and growing a second plant from it.
Cloning mushrooms will form the bulk of the work involved with growing mushrooms. Before
buying mushroom culture from a vendor, we'll practice cloning on store bought mushrooms.
(More on this in later posts)
This is the "seedling stage" of mushroom growing. What you get from this stage is called spawn.
Mycelium is initially grown in grain from a culture syringe you would buy. The grain can be
anything that at least has the bran on it. Any grain with its hull is fine as well. Mushrooms eat
fibre, so polished rice will not work. Seeds from wild grass and plants is something you will be
able to harvest in the aftertime. But before the shift, wild bird seed is a cheaper alternative than
grass seed or any other grain.
Fruiting the mushrooms
The grain spawn can eventually be added to straw (not hay), or any other brown plant material
like yard debris (brown leaves) or lawn clippings that have been dried to a straw-like color.
Alternative # 2
Instead of grain spawn, wooden dowels with mycelium spawn can also be purchased
(or made). They are meant to be drilled into logs and fruited. Conifer wood cannot be used.
What mushrooms can I grow?
There are warm weather and cool weather mushrooms. Warm weather ones prefer 20 - 30 oC (70
- 86 oF) to fruit. Cool weather ones prefer 10-20 oC (50 - 70 oF) to fruit.
In the vegetative state, when the mycelium is spreading through the grain jars, logs, or straw
baskets, it prefers room temperature.
Pink Oyster (Pleurotus djamor): Warm weather (click for growing requirements)
& Blue Oyster (Pleurotus ostreatus var. columbinus): Cool weather (click for growing
requirements)
PS:
www.shroomery.org
Should you choose to grow mushrooms, you will find that website & its forum tremendously
helpful.
ii)I am not an expert mushroom grower. I have only started on this endeavour for the last 3
months or so. So keep in mind that I'm still a novice.
iii)The following link does a good job of demonstrating how to grow mushrooms . I highly
recommend it.
1)Mushrooms that break down brown plant materials (like oyster mushrooms) &
2)Mushrooms that need dung. Portobello/white button mushrooms fall under the second
category.
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Mushrooms provide a good source of food for when it is dark and hard to grow anything
else. This in fact may be one of the most important home grown foods in hard times.
Wonder how much protein mushrooms can provide over meat or potatoes? Must be good
nutrition growing these from scratch. This is great info thanks!
Reply
1) Allergies: Oyster mushrooms produce heavy amounts of spores. So you must not grow
them indoors; and most certainly not in your bedroom or anywhere else you plan to be
around for a long time. If you already have respiratory problems, this may not be suitable
for you.
People can adopt an allergy to this. It usually takes a couple of months to show up--
producing flu-like syptoms (without the runny nose). Once you get this allergy then you
will have to stop growing oyster mushrooms all together. Here is a report on people
showing these allergy symptoms from a mushroom factory: Link: oyster mushroom
indoor health risk
So when growing oyster mushrooms, grow them outdoors. This will ensure you dont
have the spore load circulating inside your house. Grow them in a makeshift tent, in the
open, garage, or anywhere outside the house.
Also, to minimize the amount of spores released, pick them when they're young (will
discuss this later).
(I myself dont have any outdoor space. So, I too need to come up with a way to minimize
contact with their spores).
2) Pressure Cooker: A pressure cooker is essential for this hobby. When we first prepare
the mushroom "spawn" ( i.e. mushroom seedlings), the grain or wood dowels used for
this purpose, need to be sterilized. If mushroom culture is started in unsterilized jars of
grain, you will have a whole host of other germs and contaminants in the jar. (Think
rotten food). Unfortunately boiling water does not kill all the contaminants.
The only way to sterilize spawn jars is to use the pressure cooker. Under pressure,
pressure cookers will reach temperatures of 121 C (250 F), which is sufficient to kill all
germs that would impede the growth of the mushroom.
Reply
The container in the picture is only 1 inch deep and 5 inches wide.
Later, you will transfer this culture to several jars of grain to make mushroom spawn.
i)Pressure Cooker,
ii)Candle
iv)Small tupperware,
v)Aluminum foil
vi)Grain
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All it is, is a transparent storage tote with two holes for your arms to get through. You
would be doing "mushroom work" inside the tote. When not in use, the holes are kept
shut. Get one that is atleast 40 + quarts/litres.
I dont have power tools to drill holes through. So I just taped a sheet of plastic on top
and cut two holes through.
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-Soak your grain in water overnight. I'm using grass seed(most easily accessible in the
aftertime) & wild bird seed (cheapest option before the shift) for this demonstration.
- Cook the grain in water for 15 minutes on a high heat setting.
- Crush the grain in a mortar and pestle. (No need to exert yourself here)
Important -- When in the container, the grain should not be water logged; but just
hydrated and moist. Mushrooms dont colonize substrates that are waterlogged. If you tilt
the container and see water seeping over, put the grains back in the colander to let sit.
(But not for too long that the grains become dry)
-Shut the tupperware. Cover it in aluminum foil. Cover the utility knife blade/scalpel in
foil as well.
-Once you're done, let the pressure cooker sit over night to cool. Or you can rush the
process and remove the contents to free the pressure cooker for another batch. Do not
remove the blade from inside the foil.
(Repeatedly rushing the cooling process during the winter may cause glass jars to crack
prematurely)
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The contents should not block any of the pressure relief nozzles on the lid.
The water level needs to be atleast 3-4 inches deep as well. This is so that the cooker
doesnt run dry.
The water level must be below 2 inches of the containers' opening. Else, water may
splash into your jars/tupperware and mess up the water content.
Close the Pressure Cooker, turn the heat on high & take the weight piece off the cooker.
Let the steam vent through for a couple of minutes and place the weight/rocker back on.
Wait for the rocker to rock or the weight to lift, and turn the heat on a setting so that the
rocker is just barely rocking. On my pressure cooker this is close to the lowest setting.
Initially, take the cooker off the stove and check the water level every 30-40 minutes.
Resume the countdown to 90 min, after the cooker has become pressurized again.
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Step 2: Cloning
(Some of the pictures may show work being done in open air.
They are only for demonstration purposes. All work done with mushrooms must be done
inside a still air box)
When starting off, we'll practice cloning a store bought mushroom. Buy any mushroom
(link: http://www.mushrooms.ca/about/varieties.aspx) you can. Make sure they look
fresh.
(After doing this step once, you can repeat the process with a culture syringe from a
vendor).
- Close all windows and turn the air conditioning off. This is to
slim the chances of letting air borne contaminants from landing on your work. Hygiene
and Sanitation are extremely important.
-Wipe the inside of the storage tote/ still air box & under the lid with warm soapy water.
This will get contaminants to stick on the inside instead of falling over your work
-Wipe down your tupperware and surrounding work space with disinfectant wipes. (Once
you master these routines, you will be able to get away without doing them. Until then, it
is best to minimize early failures)
-Place your clean grain filled tupperware, foil covered blade and mushroom on a clean
piece of foil or disinfectant wipe inside the storage tote.
-Light a candle outside the still air box. Dont bring it in the box.
- Change into a new t-shirt & wash hands from elbows down for
at least 30 seconds again.
The rest of the work happens inside the still air box
-Loosen the lids to the tupperware, so that you can open and close them quickly.
-Tear open the mushroom to reveal clean tissue. Dont touch the inside.
-Holding the desired mushroom piece in one hand, unwrap the blade from the foil.
-Place the cutting edge of the blade in the candle fire for 5 seconds.
-Cut a clean wedge from the inside of the mushroom about the size of 1 grain of rice, and
place it in the tupperware. One container could hold 3 wedges.
Reply
-Once you see growth like this, transfer 1 cm2 wedges to a couple of sterilized "grain-
layered" tupperware again. This time place 1 wedge per container. The wedges must be
taken from the outer circumference of the mycelium & must be done before the
mycelium envelopes the entire container. Label your containers.
- After some days, this picture below is what you will get:
If you cloned the culture from a store bought mushroom, dont bother fruiting it.
Mushroom farms/factories stretch their mycelium culture by cloning it over and over,
until the mycelium culture hits "old age". Only once the mycelium hits old age do they
attempt to fruit the mushrooms. They do this to get the most bang for their buck. A store
bought mushroom will form mycelium but the culture is not virile when it comes to
fruiting into mushrooms.
If you cloned the culture from a vendor's syringe, your mycelium culture can now be
used to make mushroom spawn . (This is the next stage)
Questions
A-Initially despite our attempts, there would have been hidden contaminants along with
the mushroom tissue. When you transfer wedges from the outer perimeter of the
mycelium, you are picking mycelium that will likely have outrun other contaminants.
Placing the new wedge into the second container will give us a culture that has a lower
rate of contaminants.
Q-What If I want to skip this step and start with a culture syringe from a vendor?
A-Once you get past this stage for the first time (or wish to directly start from a vendor's
culture syringe), the steps would be similar.
Instead of cutting mushroom tissue, you'd squirt 1ml of liquid culture (from the vendor's
syringe). And instead of flame sterilizing the blade, you flame the tip of the needle
(making sure not to bring the flame near the plastic of the needle):
When buying a culture syringe from a vendor, make sure to do your research on them. It
is a bad idea to buy from a company that has no reputation. Check the internet for
reviews. Getting clean syringes from a reputable company will make things much easier
for you.
A-Spawn is the culture of mushroom mycelium that is grown on grains. Grains are
nutritious and easily broken into and mixed in the final substrate that the Mushroom will
be fruited from.
A-I used to have a 5 quart pressure cooker, and had a hard time with it. When I seriously
got into mushroom growing, sterilizing contents in a small pressure cooker would take
too long. So, I bought an 8 quart (7.6 litre) pressure cooker. Try looking through thrift
stores, if money is tight. I got a Presto Brand for $60.00.
If you're Pressure Cooker isnt rocking the weight, and steam is escaping, then pressure
isnt building inside the Cooker. You can try tightening the nuts around the nozzles.
However, chances are the sealing ring has hardened and shrunk from use over the years.
Adjusting it may or may not help. But most probably you will have to get a new sealing
ring. If buying a new Pressure cooker, it's a good idea to get some extra sealing rings (for
the aftertime).
good luck.
Reply
Permalink Reply by casey a on September 28, 2013 at 1:03am
In gardening terms, this stage is the equivalent of growing seedlings. At the end of this
stage, you will have mushroom spawn ready to be "transplanted" into its final stage.
Required items:
i) Pressure Cooker
iv) Polyfill (Polyester fibre found in pillows and stuffed toys, duvets,etc)
The jars used, need a way for the spawn to "breathe" while preventing contaminants from
getting in.
- Pull some polyfill from a pillow. Twist it and stuff it through the hole.
- Trim excess polyfill. You can also use a lighter to mat it down.
-Drain grain and let sit for 30 min in colander. (It is important that once the grain is in the
jars,
-Fill jars. Leave a third to a fifth of it empty.(Grain will expand in the cooker)
-Loosen the lid ever so slightly. One-eighth of a turn is enough. Cover the top of the lids
with foil. This is to prevent condensation from getting back on to the polyfill. You can
reuse the foil used for this purpose.
-Sterilize jars as outlined in the previous stage. This is where the size of your pressure
cooker and the jars you use matters. A big/medium size pressure cooker (8 +quarts) lets
you get through this stage quicker. A small one (5 quarts) may get the job done but is time
consuming.
Make sure the jars dont touch the side of the pressure cooker, with the help of spoons or
jar lids.
Stage 3: Transferring mycelium
transfer 1 sq cm wedges from your container in the previous stage to your grain jars.
- This needs to be done in a still air box along with proper sanitation techniques outlined
in the previous stage.
Over the next week or two, the entire jar will be enveloped in mycelium.
The jars I use are 1 pint (0.5 litre) jars. 20 of these will produce enough spawn to be
transplanted into a laundry basket for the final
stage. I used two containers from the previous stage to get 20 wedges.
* If you didnt prepare for this stage while the mycelium was growing in the container
from the previous stage, you can toss the container in the fridge to stall its growth (along
with any possible contaminants)
Reply
This is the stage where the mycelium grows out, after which mushrooms are produced.
The mushroom spawn is mixed with a bulk substrate (straw, yard debris, wood or dried
lawn clippings).
Required Items:
i) Laundry basket
v) Straw
- Cut Straw into 3-5 inch pieces using a pair of garden shears. (This doesnt have to be
precise)
- Let the straw sit in a water filled tote. Weigh it down to make sure all the straw is under
water. Drain after a couple of hours
- Next we pasteurize the straw. To do this, pour boiling water in the tote filled with straw.
Shut the tote, and let sit for 2 hours. Make sure that the steam doesn't escape.
-Drain. And let the straw cool and drain. Wait 6 - 8 hours. The straw should be cool to the
touch, but slightly moist as well. If you grab and squeeze some straw, you should not see
water dripping out.
The ratio used here will be 1 part mushroom spawn to 3 parts straw. I had about 9 Liters (
or quarts) of spawn. So I used 27 - 30 "liters" of straw. (1 litre = 60 cubic inches). If you
use higher ratios of the bulk substrates, that leaves room for contaminants to get a
foothold in the substrate.
-Poke some drainage holes through the bottom of the laundry basket.
-Place an inch of straw on the bottom of the laundry basket, and then cover with
mushroom spawn. Make sure, that none of the spawn is placed near the edge of the
laundry basket. Repeat this process over. Finish off with a layer of straw on the top.
-Cover the basket up with a garbage bag. This is to maintain the high humidity. But too
much water can cause bacterial contamination.
-Poke holes on the side of the garbage bage, to let some air flow through.
Notes:
- Mycelium can produce a yellowish liquid that helps it digest food and fight against
bacteria. This liquid can pool inside the garbage bag. Drain it every other day.
Reply
The crumbled up spawn you see is that of pink oyster. Unfortunately after pasteurizing
the straw, I did not let it cool and drain properly. So the basket was filled with straw that
was too wet. On top of this I did not drain the liquid that the mycelium secretes.
At first (from the smell of it) everything was going well, but then it got contaminated
with bacteria. I could smell the straw fermenting. So I had to dump the whole basket.
At the moment I have a similar basket of blue oysters colonizing. But because of this
earlier setback I may not be able to provide an update next week.
Reply
[Oyster Mushrooms are] low in Sodium, and very low in Saturated Fat and Cholesterol.
It is also a good source of Protein, Thiamin, Vitamin B6, Folate, Iron, Magnesium, Zinc
and Manganese, and a very good source of Dietary Fiber, Riboflavin, Niacin,
Pantothenic Acid, Phosphorus, Potassium and Copper."
SongStar101 said:
Mushrooms provide a good source of food for when it is dark and hard to grow
anything else. This in fact may be one of the most important home grown foods
in hard times. Wonder how much protein mushrooms can provide over meat or
potatoes? Must be good nutrition growing these from scratch. This is great info
thanks!
Reply
Stage 4 - Fruiting
-Then, wait two days, and carefully cut holes through the plastic layer. (trying not to cut
through the mycelium)
-Put the substrate in a moist environment with ambient light.
Blue oyster mushrooms like to fruit between 50F to 70F (10 to 20 C) degrees.
Here's my setup.
The substrate bag, placed in a tray with a piece of transparent (or white) plastic laid on
top of it. I had two substrate bags.
Mist the inside with a spray bottle & pour just a little water on the bottom of the tray to
humidify the inside of the setup.
You will need to do this twice a day. (If your grow is outside in a bucket, carefully hose it
& make sure there are drainage holes.)
Please keep in mind oysters are not meant to be fruited indoors because of allergy issues
they can create. This was just a test run on a small scale
Reply
However the laundry basket that had these blue oysters got contaminated. The mushroom
spawn to straw ratio used in these plastic bags was one to one. In the laundry basket I
used one part spawn to 3 parts straw.
After reading up, it seems that the likely reason was that the mushroom spawn itself got
contaminated. (I had taken some shortcuts not detailed in this post)
I'm going to start the "laundry basket" method from scratch all over again. Hopefully
with a better eye on my hygiene/ sanitation techniques, I can produce consistent results
that can be duplicated. (Until then, this is it for now)...
cheers
Reply
This is an excellent discussion Casey, thanks for teaching us how to grow mushrooms.
Reply
Great discussion!
Since there will be a lot of fallen trees after the PS, I think it's best to use them for
growing mushrooms. When you inoculate on the hard wood (like oak, beech,
hornbeam...) you can harvest them for up to 7 years. The only con is that it will take 1-2
years to start fruiting. That can be solved if the part is inoculated on soft wood - under
favorable conditions, that will give mushrooms in around 3 months.
Below are photos from our little experiment almost two years old. All is on hard wood ad
it started to fruit now, besides few shitakes during the summer. We are planning to
inoculate more next month to have more varieties available.
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