Growing shrooms on popcorn - advice please

[Appel]

After reading a lot on the internet I am trying to grow my own shrooms. I decided to use popcorn as a grain spawn and am planning to case the colonised popcorn with peat based soil mixed with crushed shells.

For my first batch I made holes in the jars and covered these with bandaid, then covered the lids with aluminium foil. I read that grain substrates need air exchange, but isn't the aluminum foil preventing this?

So far, colonisation has gone very fast (faster than I expected, 2 weeks) and I can see no sign of contamination.

Do I need to make holes in the 2nd batch (I am planning to make)? Or is this just a source of contamination, do they really need air exchange and can I still cover them with aluminium foil in that case or should I try to find coffee filters or something similar?

I hope somebody with experience growing on grains can give me some advise. It seems to be going alright so far... I am just uncertain about some things. Thanks a lot!

 

[Appel]

Here's a picture of my current progress. Any comments, reactions, questions or advice are welcome. I hope to be able to post a picture of my first shrooms in a couple of weeks.

For now, on the right a fully colonised jar of popcorn which has been transfered to the box on the left with the casing material.

Wish me good luck.

 

[aryaman]

well,this looks to me corn,not really popped :)

the jar on the right looks good colonised,but what mixture are you using for casing?

 

[Appel]

Update:

My first casing (the one in the picture) has continued to grow and amaze me and it started pinning 2 days ago. Imagine my exitement.

However, as you can see in the picture, there are a lot of little doplets on the mycelium and there are little white dots on the caps of the pins. Is the white stuff mycelium that is growing on my mushrooms because the humidity is too high?

The bottom of my box is filled with hydrokorrels (substitute for perlite) and I've been fanning 3-5 times a day. Should I open the box a little and add some water to it as well to keep humidity up, lower it and get more air exchange?

Thanks for any answers, comments or sharing in the excitement!

 

[JJJ]

Great! And there are so many! I told you they would come :D The white stuff on the caps is indeed mycelium. But don't worry, it won't eat your mushrooms. I don't know if it would work to let the humidity go down, maybe then (even) more energy would be put in in making mushrooms instead of mycelium, but on the other hand, I guess it's no problem if it stays like this, the pins seem to feel comfortable in there. You could try to open the box a little, if there is some water in it then I guess it will stay moist enough. But changing nothing will probably work out just as well :) .

 

[Lion]

Do you mind if i try this method as well?
looks pretty brilliant. i'll use vermiculite in stead of perlite though.

peazze

 

[Appel]

I might change my setup a little tomorrow, they are growing great as they are and I am confident they will be fine if I leave them as they are. They've grow a little more and I can see a lot of pinheads in the next container as of today :)

I got the idea and tek on the shroomery site. I just noticed there seems to be a new one with pictures too. I basically followed this one:
http://www.shroomery.org/9033/Popcorn-Grain-Spawn
The jars colonated extremely fast compared to the pf-tek. Don't forget the holes in the jars though! I found they are very important.

I guess you'd use vermiculite in your casing, not to keep humidity up though (what I use a perlite substitute for). Succes and post some pictures of your progress if you can! I'd love to see some. And just because they're fun to look at I'll post another picture of mine where you can see how many there are. They are still small though, the biggest are about 1.5 cm.

ps. How can you post a picture without the name and description and stuff around it, like you did JJJ?

 

[Lion]

what species of shrooms btw?

 

[Appel]

These are Golden Teacher, hopefully I'll have some B+ next week too.

They are about 5 cm now, are they ready to be harvested?

 

[user_1919]

It almost looks like you have overgrown them. I say this because there is line on the mushrooms, that looks like a previous veil, that is distinctly separated from the cap. But you say they are only 5cm. I have a feeling the mushrooms are not getting the nutrients they should be getting. If I were you I would harvest them. But that is just me.

peace & love

 

[JJJ]

These are Golden Teacher, hopefully I'll have some B+ next week too.

They are about 5 cm now, are they ready to be harvested?

Yes! After the veils break and the caps open, they will not grow much, so they are ready to harvest. And after the caps have opened, spores will be deposited on your casing, which will make it look like a mess. Probably they will get much larger in later flushes, if you soak the casings overnight in between ('dunking' the casings).

 

[Appel]

I've had many different experiences with the mushrooms from this little experiment of mine. Usually the first flush of my casings turns out good, I think I've lowered humidity too much for a while, had more mushrooms growing on the bottom of the casing then on top, some seized growing altogether and some produce a lonely mushroom every now and then.

There have been some opposites even within the same strain. One of my GT casings grew beautiful mushrooms that were about 15 cm, now however I have a casing with fully grown(?) mushrooms that are 1 cm at most...

I've been dunking the harvested casings, they are now on perlite (subsitute) and I fan a couple times a day. Any thoughts on what to do with the casing with the tiny mushrooms? And is there a temperature below which mushrooms stop growing/pinning?

 

[Cannafarmer]

WOW popcorn as spawn, never thought of that!

what is the black thing in the jar if I may ask?
Looks good though man, you've done an outstanding job!

hmmz what's the black? :p

 

[Appel]

The black is peat based soil mixed with crushed shells. Seemed the best I could think of at that time and it worked! My cakes seem to dry out before any mushrooms grow and the casing really helps. Overall it was a succes.

I am not sure I would try to grow them on corn again, I will try some other (grain) substrate next time. Since it was my first time I don't have much to compare it with, but I expected larger 2nd and 3rd flushes. Maybe they stayed small (size or number) because of conditions, maybe because of the substrate. Colonization was very fast, it is very easy to get the right moisture content in the jars and I had no contams in any of the jars I injected with a syringe. Good luck to anybody who is going to try it.

And another picture :) because I think they are beautiful.

 

[Cannafarmer]

I never worked with spawn. But it's something I must do!
The last grew of mushrooms I had was on riceflour, worked very well man. As long you keep them in the jar, I made the fault first by taking them out.
I'm not sayin others cant pull it off, but I simply couldn't get shrooms with open riceflours. Humidity was at its max, still no shroom.
There were shrooms coming on the riceflour as soon I cased it.

Riceflour iss not something you use as spawn though.
I simpy injected the syringe in riceflour mixed with vermiculite and it worked very well.
I heard you can also use birdseeds, grasseeds, and so many other substances as spawn.
But I have ordered the normal filterboxes at ******* for my spawn now.
It always goes bad with me, it really smells rotten. I sterilised it though.
I simply don't know where I go wrong whenever I start to make my own spawn
I just hope the filterboxes from ******* will solve my problem

riceflour :) (if you don't like other pictures in your report, please report it to me, Ill take him out)

Please do order some filterbags at *******, 1,25 euro a piece and they work very well! They keep it sterile

 

[Appel]

Please leave the picture, I love pictures!

I had the same experience with riceflour-vermiculite cakes, they grew very good when I cased them. Since vermicule was harder to get, I decided to try a grain spawn, popcorn this time.

I got a filter bag from a friend and I am now testing it with the last one of my casings. Are you supposed to put water in the bag so the plastic container the mycelium is in is standing in the water to keep humidity up?

Do you let your grain stand in water a day or two before cooking/simmering and sterilising? That's my best guess where it goes wrong... And could somebody please explain how to post pictures without the yellow box around them like mine have! And what do you use as a casing? Anybody tried different casings to see which one works best?

 

[Cannafarmer]

Yes, you can poor some water in the bag to keep the humidity high.
I always do so. But not everybody does.
As long there is condens on the bag, it's all alright.

To post an image here, you can copy paste the image link, select it and click img.

without space.

No I have never soaked them, I always sterilized it in the jars with water.
Good that you tell me! I might try that now!

I bought 1200 ml filterboxes at ******* for less then 2 euro's.
There shippingprice is only 6 euro, no matter what you order. I find it the best website to get all my shroom supplies.
Vermiculite is also there.

You can also use a curverboxes. Then a filterbag isn't nescaserry I guess.
It seems you handle it all well, so you'll be an expert pretty soon :)
Good luck man

 

[Cannafarmer]

Hey man,

I soaked popcorn for 24h
I've put them to a boilingpoint for 3 minuts
Let it drain for 30 minuts
Filled my jars and sterilised it
Now wait and see :)