General Mushroom FAQ. A Complete Guide to Cleaning and Sanitation. Beer has been brewed for thousands of years and the majority of this brewing was done before anyone knew about germs or sanitation.
Sometimes the beer was good and sometimes it wasn't. Over time, brewers learned which practices seemed to make good beer, and these practices became ritual. A case in point is the historic Norwegian beer totems r used in the Middle Ages. Michael Jackson reports that these sticks were passed down from generation to generation and used to stir the developing beer. The totems harbored yeast (and bacteria) of previous batches.
Late in the 1860s, Louis Pasteur discovered yeast as the cause of fermentation. Sanitation is important because without it our wort, and even beer, could become infected with bacteria or wild yeast leading to off-flavors and off-aromas. Let's begin by defining some terms. The best a homebrewer can hope for is to clean and sanitize brewing equipment and sanitize the wort that ultimately ferments (boiling accomplishes this). Acetic Acid. What is the most potent mushroom? How To Grow Magic Mushrooms The Magic Mushroom Growers Guide (page 1) Mushrooms MMGG - Magic Mushroom Growers Guide (page 1) These directions are for the indoor cultivation of a species of mushrooms called Psilocybe cubensis.
Unless informed otherwise, if you buy magic mushrooms that were grown indoors, Psilocybe cubensis is probably the species you are dealing with. It is the intent of this document to enable the first time mushroom grower to succeed in producing their own supply of Psilocybe cubensis, at a minimal cost and with a minimal amount of effort. What is agar and why might it be interesting to me? What are some good agar media recipes? Fatguy's Agar Technique. Agar inoculation has been used for cultivation mushrooms as well as bacteria and molds for several years.
The key to using an agar solution in cultivating mushrooms is sterility. Keeping the work surface and your hands clean and free of contaminants is the most important thing in using agar. I recommend that a HEPA system be used but since most people that use this forum cannot afford one, a glove box can be successfully used or a homemade HEPA design (what I use) will work. FastFred's Media Cookbook.
Which kinds of grain can I use? Do I need a pressure cooker if I want to prepare grains? How to inoculate a jar with a poly-fill filter lid with a syringe? How can I tell if a grain jar is fully colonized? From syringe to print using rye. The 9er Tek. Psilly Simon's Mushroom Growin' Guide II. I have tried several methods to grow mushrooms and have run into problems with all of them.
The Oss & Oeric Method is good but the instructions can be confusing at times. I have found the "rice cake" method to also be very fruitless as I could not force any of the jars to actually produce mushrooms. Eating the mushroomless rice cakes didnt do anything but taste bad. Correct pressure cooker use. Pressure cookers and canner are important tools in mycological work.
When used properly they guarantee the preparation of thoroughly sterilized mushroom growing substrates and tools. This FAQ should give some answers on the correct use of pressure cookers. Pressure cooker types Pressure cooking step by step. Why case? Why not? The casing layer serves 4 purposes: 1.)
To protect the colonized substrate from drying out. 2.) 50/50+ Casing Tek. Here is a real easy casing mix that works great for cubensis, panaeolus, and other species.
Our growers and people worldwide have had great success with this very easy casing method. At the end of this document, look and read the updated 50/50 (PLUS) Casing Tek. We highly recommend the 50/50 tek over any other casing tek out there. The addition of limestone and crushed oyster shell to the 50/50 mix makes a huge difference. We suggest using plastic trays. How do I initiate pinning on a casing? Should I use a bottom casing Layer? There is a very popular debate in the OMC (online mushroom community) about whether or not to add a bottom casing layer to a casing (usually a vermiculite or sometimes coir layer, notwithstanding what you used to case the top layer with).
TMC refers to a bottom casing layer only once: "As an option, a layer of partially moistened vermiculite can be placed along the bottom of the trayto absorb excess water. (TMC p 134, Emphasis added). Some of the arguments for each are as follows: What different casing layer ingredients are there? Peat (=Sphagnum Peat Moss) Unconsolidated soil material consisting largely of undecomposed, or only slightly decomposed, organic matter accumulated under conditions of excessive moisture.
Main ingredient of many casing formulations, its pH ranges from 3-4 (acidic), has to be brought to neutral or slightly basic (pH 7-8) by adding a buffer (limestone flour, calcium carbonate or oyster shells) There are different kinds of peat, depending on its decomposition state. In mushroom cultivation mostly the darker varieties are used. Vermiculite Ingredient of the popular 50/50 casing mix, can also be used as the solely casing ingredient. Peat based potting soil Can be used instead of peat, in this case one can use less limestone flour, since the pH of the soil is usually already around 5 - 6.
How moist should the casing mixture be? What is the difference between pasteurization and sterilization of casings and substrates? Oven-Bag Pasteurization Pictorial. This method was first brought to my attention by our fellow member, 6Tango.
It is a great way for the pasteurization of straw/compost/dung. I have noticed that unlike the conventional method of "cooking" your bulk substrates in a pillowcase submerged in water, there is no strong odor, no loss of nutrients and no excess water drainage. The best is that you will not have to wait a few days to inoculate, due to the time for your pillowcase to drain all its excess water!!
When you pasteurize your straw/compost/dung in submerged water, you will notice that the resulting water is brown. This is most of the nitrogen and other nutrients which are flushed out from the substrate, not to mention your pot is pretty dirty and brown afterwards. So here is the full pictorial of how using an oven-bag, and baking your compost/straw/dung in the oven to achieve full pasteurization. Materials Oven, oven safe bags, bulk substrate, water, tape (or string), meat thermometer.
Preparation Baking. What is considered a bulk substrate? What spawn to substrate ratio should I use when inoculating bulk substrates? How to do Coir. I have been asked several times how do I prepare my coir, so here is a quick step by step on how I prepare my coir. I have done it this way about 20-25 times with no contamination's before the 3rd flush. This is a very elementary tek but it works wonders. Supplies Needed. ShroomGod's Straw Tek. Preparing spawn bags. Why Use Spawn Bags?
Regardless of the type of mushroom that one wants to grow, spawn bags provide an excellent solution to handle many pounds of substrate in a totally sterile environment with relative ease. Spawn bags can be used to colonize either spawn or the final fruiting substrate (which can then be laid in a tray if desired). As a cultivation tool for the colonizing the fruiting substrate, spawn bags greatly simplify the process of bulk growing, reducing the chance of failure and speeding the growing cycle by one or two weeks since the spawning process is bypassed entirely.
The books covering spawn bag methodologies describe usage assuming one has access to a HEPA filtered flow hood, so one can easily be intimidated assuming spawn bags are in the domain of professional growers only. Nothing, though, could be further from the truth! What is the best means of humidification? Humidifying FAQ. What are the benefits of using an air pump?
It allows for better humidification in conjunction with perlite, geolite and lava rocks. It also provides automatic aeration pushing the C02 up and out the FAE holes in the PMP lid, so there is no need for misting or fanning! What size air pump do I need to use? The following chart shows how much air needs to be pumped out to get to the 2-3 air exchanges per hour rate sugged in the Poor Man's Pod (PMP) tek for a container of a given size. Values are in cubic centimeters per minute and liters per hour and 2-3 air exchanges per hour. Calibrate Your Hygrometer. Remote RH Sensor. OK, so I've seen that alot of people are purchasing $20-30 weather stations at Walmart and such, and asking why it only reads 40% RH or something low for what it should be in their terrarium. The reason for this is that the remote sensor on these is ONLY for outside temperature. It seems that the ones with remote RH sensors are more pricey and are a little more difficult to find.
This leads people to just chunk the whole thing in their terrarium only to find out the unit itself isn't waterproof and now its broken. Lighting Requirements of Mushrooms. ShroomGod's Humidifier Tek. Monotub. Cybers Martha Tek. This setup was originaly done by Magash. As there was no TEK on it I decided to write one. A Martha is a large fruiting chamber that maintains it's own humidity and air exchange, no fanning, no misting, just load it up add water and wait . It was named for the Martha Stewart portable closet from K-Mart. This is what the first ones were made from. Things you will need. Automated Greenhouse Guide...By Helltick. Chamber Pictures for Reference - Shroomtalk. Teh Fire-and-4get Bubbleh Humidifier. PF-Tek for Simple Minds.
Stoned_Myconaut's Outdoor Grow Tek (Southern Style) When will I see a flush and how much? TheNewGuy's Outdoor Tek. #1 Gather your colonized spawn. Be it cakes or grain spawn, it should be 100% colonized. Gently pack the jars in a super thick construction trash bag or something similar to transport them to their new home. DO NOT open the jars until they are ready to be broken up and dropped into the substrate. The less exposure to the outside world the better.#2 Place your unpasteurized horse poo in a doubled Rubbermaid bin or a large stock pot.
Which climate zones make the cultivation of woodlovers possible? Which species can be cultivated outdoors on woodchips? Moe's Outdoor Growing Tek. This tek is intended for the outdoor cultivation of Psilocybe cubensis mushrooms. It is suitable for climates where the daytime temperature is between 65°F-100°F in the Summer for at least a few weeks.
Water: a hose or someway to get the freakin water to the outdoor patch Manure: any kind will do. I get the cheap bag from walmart. Regular manure, nothing fancy if you can get it fresh.. yaay. Spore Prints and Syringes FAQ. Making clean spore prints. Spore printing pictorial. How to make a spore syringe. Resurrecting a Better Method for Long-Term Storage of Mushroom Cultures. General Mushroom FAQ. Cyber's Drying mushrooms FAQ.