Mushroom fruiting chamber project

Eric Group

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This thread got really cool... I freaking LOVE mushrooms! Shitake might well be my favorites, the oysters are good too... Not a big portobello fan personally.

These look pretty easy to grow... might be a good new project for me to try one day...

Is it possible to grow truffles in a similar way to how you guys are growing mushrooms? Talk about where the money is!
 

wireme

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This thread got really cool... I freaking LOVE mushrooms! Shitake might well be my favorites, the oysters are good too... Not a big portobello fan personally.

These look pretty easy to grow... might be a good new project for me to try one day...

Is it possible to grow truffles in a similar way to how you guys are growing mushrooms? Talk about where the money is!

Truffles? Sure no problem, they're mycorrhizal so you innoculate a bunch of trees, plant them and then wait thirty or forty years hoping that it might actually work. People are trying, I think some of the first North American plantations are just starting to produce now.
 

wireme

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Progress has been slow, the sawmill did breakdown. By the time I got it fixed it was inaccessible and buried. Dug it out recently. image.jpg Made it this far by now. Pretty much done with materials I can make myself or have salvaged. Got this far with under $100 though, not bad. Hopefully will be running soon but depends on time and material so...image.jpg
 

Wires_Guy_wires

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That's one good looking fruiting chamber! Awesome!
I found that I can raise the price of pink oysters when I deprive them from oxygen. They antler pretty nicely and start looking alien. The texture changes too, to somewhat more puffy insteaf of stringy.
The chefs around here pay me good money for that (double weird; pink and freaky looking), even though they're pathetic excuses for mushrooms compared to the flying saucers they produce in a well aerated environment.

I'm also setting up some recycling works (hoping to get subsidized) to collect coffee grounds from restaurants and sell them inoculated spawn bags with a discount in return. It might work better for you than it does for me, I don't have the room nor the time and my diy flow hood broke down. So it's back to just maintaining cultures next to the good ol' bunsenburner.
 

JoeR

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I cringe at how arrogant my original posts in this thread sounded, was not my intent, BUT any updates?? This is such a cool project. I'm thinking about going to a log inoculation class, so I was reading through the forums to learn more about it

@wireme
 

GailC

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@Wires_Guy_wires are those woodchip blocks reusable? For how long?
Makes me wonder if I could set up a shelf in the basement.
 

Wires_Guy_wires

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They fruit for two, maybe six times depending on what type of mushroom you're growing. It also depends a whole lot on the temperature and watering habits.
I grow oyster mushrooms on bags of hay I buy for 2 euros at the pet store. They give roughly 4-7 flushes that are worth consuming.
This ganoderma culture is fruiting for the second time now, but the flushes are inferior to the ones I have had in the past.
I'm not a big fan of using logs because they have varying results; conditions have to be right, otherwise they just stay dormant and other fungi take over. A friend of mine bought 5 shiitake logs and he got to harvest them once. At the supermarket they sell the same amount of mushrooms he harvested for less than a dollar.

Don't get me wrong, but mushrooms need fresh - sometimes moving - air and they don't mind light at all. Basements are housing a lot of insects (rolly pollies, woodlice aren't insects but hey, who cares), fungi and bacteria that would love to nibble on fungal cultures. It can be done, but a shed above ground or even a greenhouse are better.
 

wireme

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I cringe at how arrogant my original posts in this thread sounded, was not my intent, BUT any updates?? This is such a cool project. I'm thinking about going to a log inoculation class, so I was reading through the forums to learn more about it

@wireme
Hey Joe.

Ha, I’ll not go back and look at earlier posts then just in case you’re right!

Not much to update. The building is great, environmental controls very minimal so it doesn’t rock year round. I do have some in there now but just for personal eating, too cold and slow growing over winter to grow for sale. I could change that but it would barely be worth the energy consumption and I get pretty good mushroom growing burnout by fall anyways. Early spring through to early winter it’s often producing well in there.

Speaking of logs I’ve always wanted to inoculate the large rounds of wood that I sit my trees on. I water them all the time anyways so it could be a good dual purpose thing. Never have though, one day...

What I do do is mulch trees over winter with wood chips that are inoculated with garden giant spawn. Then I just leave it there under the trees. Lots of mushrooms grow over the summer, mulch is deep enough that there is no grass to deal with under the tree poles. Every other year I wheelbarrow the broken down mulch over to the garden side because it has become beautiful soil. Pretty much win/win all around I figure.
 
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