116 replies to this topic

[FunnyFarmer]

I had to abandon the GWM grow as it got contamed with some sort of blob like growth and it wasn't shroom blobs. For this one I'm trying a new to me method of LC, I put about 8CC in each qt jar of rye (3 qts) about 4 days ago. So far I'm not seeing any activity and yes I swirled the jar before taking the sample, made sure I saw mycelia in the syringe before injecting it. I used standard needle heating and iso wipes of the ports when taking and injecting the LC. After injecting I gave the jars a good tumble.So far I'm more inclined to use A2G the next time, I was seeing good activity within 4 days with that method.

 

Question for everyone, is an agar dish still a candidate for A2G if it shriveled up in the dish? Would putting a bit of water in the dish help rehydrate it before putting it in with the grain?

[Oldpunk]

Might have better luck hydrating and Then transferring to a new agar plate. Wait till that grows in and use that one. But to be honest. I don't know that it wouldn't work either. I found some that I left for dead this spring and was almost thinking of trying it as well. Just to see if it works.

Maybe we should try it.?

[FunnyFarmer]

Might have better luck hydrating and Then transferring to a new agar plate. Wait till that grows in and use that one. But to be honest. I don't know that it wouldn't work either. I found some that I left for dead this spring and was almost thinking of trying it as well. Just to see if it works.
Maybe we should try it.?

If spores can survive outer space what's a little drying out gonna do to them? I've got enough PB agar dishes for 5 qts. I could have done a drag race between the two different methods... LC2G vs A2G. My money would be on the agar.

Edited by FunnyFarmer, 05 December 2021 - 03:31 AM.

[FunnyFarmer]

Sometimes a lack of patience can kinda bite you in the ass. After 4 days of no activity I decided to put this effort on the back shelf and let it do it's thing and started  another round of rye. Before going to bed I gave the jars another look see with a flashlight and noticed mycelia in the bottom that I hadn't noticed before. Well, I can't stop the rye soak so going to proceed with both projects. With this new one I made up 3 qts and 3 pints to inoculate with a variety of agar samples then into the fridge after they colonize for future projects. I've got most of the day to make up my mind as to which varieties I'll go with. It will be either Argentina or PB for the qts and haven't made up my mind about the pts yet. I've got TW, GWM, PR and the A+Albino. I have a very small amount of Ecuador in agar but it's not very energetic, I'm not inclined to use it. Then there's the syringes I got yesterday, McKenna, JMF and BPK along with a Pan "estero" print but that's a totally different grow that I'm saving for later after I do some more research. So of all those specimens which would be your choice for the pints?

Edited by FunnyFarmer, 07 December 2021 - 11:35 AM.

[ElPirana]

You might try giving that dried mycelium a go. I was able to revive two-year-old dried shrooms. These things are pretty amazing! Here’s where I documented that grow:
https://mycotopia.ne...ar-old-samples/

[FunnyFarmer]

You might try giving that dried mycelium a go. I was able to revive two-year-old dried shrooms. These things are pretty amazing! Here’s where I documented that grow:
https://mycotopia.ne...ar-old-samples/

The Ecuador was a second transfer from agar that was started from a syringe. It never really showed any vigor, while other specimens took off this one just sits there. I'm not inclined to play with something that doesn't show any initiative from the get go. Another syringe  I purchased about the same time, Argentina, showed great rhisomorphic growth on agar and got put in the quart jars this time. I had tried it last year with BRF tek but was inexperienced and it failed after producing a few shrooms. I'm not a fan of BRF... I decided to put PE6, TW, and GWM  in pint jars for future G2G projects.

 

As for your idea to use dried up agar chips with mycelia it sounds like an idea worthy of following up on. I've about 4 of them I was considering pitching but will reconsider. Today I learned the value of pouring just a little bit more agar in the dishes, to shallow of a dish makes it difficult to cut them up before putting to grain. Cut one way is OK but cutting cross ways can be challenging...

[FunnyFarmer]

A check today of all the jars showed good mycelia growth in all, both tomentose and rhizome with rhizome in 3 out of 5 jars. My predictions of the A2G vs LC2G may not hold out. So far the LC is in the lead but the agar isn't far behind. Where it took the LC four days to show signs the agar was already fuzzing up by the second day. The Argentina syringe has kinda surprised me with the vigor it's shown, especially when compared to the Ecuador which was bought about the same time.The agar could still come up from behind and that could be problematic when it comes time to get the sub ready.

 

At the pace they're going both (Arg and PESA) might be ready by next weekend for spawning. Gotta get that sub prep right... which means I need to get some sort of spacer made for the double boiler idea in the electric roaster for the pasteurization step. I want to elevate the foil pan about 1/2" so the water can envelop the pan for more even heat distribution. I've got an idea for that but need to find the material first. I think I've got the problem with the PH adjustment figured out, I'll use the 9.5 alkaline water drink to bring it up to 7 from the 5 it showed the last time then add spring (or distilled) water to field capacity and abstain from adding dextrose to the mix at the beginning of the mixing. That brings up a question, is there any time that it's appropriate to add it or should I remove it from my recipes?

[FunnyFarmer]

Well, it's no longer a race, the LC is clearly in the lead and could be ready in a few days but I'll wait until next weekend to spawn it. I'm getting mixed results with the A2G, some are showing good rhizomous growth but not very speedy yet, with some jars the agar pieces are getting fuzzy but not moving to the grain, that's the Argentina. On the other hand the pint jars for future projects are progressing nicely.

Edited by FunnyFarmer, 12 December 2021 - 12:51 AM.

[FunnyFarmer]

As usual the bottom of the jars are slow to colonize so I stood them on the lid and coaxed the rye ball towards the lid. That air space is enough to encourage the mycelia to finish colonizing the bottom. Without the space the colonization is reluctant to proceed.

[FunnyFarmer]

Flipping the jars did the trick, the bottoms of the jars fully colonized. This morning I S2B, I love the smell of spawn in the morning.

Edited by FunnyFarmer, 18 December 2021 - 01:19 PM.

[FunnyFarmer]

Day 6 after spawning the PESA. They're happy, I'm happy. But there's a cautious worry considering how the GWM turned out, it started out almost the same way. I'm trying really hard not to voodoo jinx it by putting excessive worry around it.

 

[FunnyFarmer]

Two days ago I spawned the Argentina to sub and yesterday took the PesA to FC. Nice dense mycelia coverage but no primordia yet, I'm hoping some serious fanning gets things going. And the waiting game starts all over again... I should post a pic but don't want to wake it up for a photo OP, maybe tomorrow if I can remember.

[FunnyFarmer]

Busy day yesterday so here's the PESA grow. It's been like this since day 4 after spawning it. Not sure why there's no primordia yet but the colonization looks great, the dark end is just shadow otherwise it's a nice uniform white. This is the second day since putting it to FC. Maybe add a layer of bubble wrap?

 

Edited by FunnyFarmer, 30 December 2021 - 03:20 PM.

[FunnyFarmer]

I finally got primordia on the PESA! I backed off on misting the tub and put the tub back on the heat mat, the temp had dropped to low 70's and had some bruising on the sub.

[FunnyFarmer]

Last night I harvested the first shroom from this grow, so far today I've got a total of 155 wet grams with more to come from this flush. The best thing is they are giants compared to the Treasure Coast grow of a few months ago. You can't see it in the pics but some of the caps have a dark teal blush on the cap and when picking they bruise that same teal color.

 

 

 

The center of the tub is mostly empty but I'm hoping the second flush will fill it in. The green color on the sub is actually dark blue from bruising. Evidently I got too much overspray on the sub when misting the sides of the tub. So I increased the fanning to 90 seconds to dry out the sub surface.

Edited by FunnyFarmer, 11 January 2022 - 10:02 PM.

[jkdeth]

Keep us updated, and a bioassay. That teal staining I don't fully understand yet, but the most potent classic cube I've grown had green staining, even in the hyphal knotting.

I haven't been able to duplicate yet, don't know if it was genetic, but I fear it was caused by contaminant stress.

[FunnyFarmer]

Keep us updated, and a bioassay. That teal staining I don't fully understand yet, but the most potent classic cube I've grown had green staining, even in the hyphal knotting.

I haven't been able to duplicate yet, don't know if it was genetic, but I fear it was caused by contaminant stress.

I'll do what I can to give a history of this grow. It started out as a syringe (don't remember the vendor but could be Ralphstersspores about year and a half old) that I put to agar. I sampled it a couple times, the second showing good rhizomorphic development so I did a third sample for good measure then put it to LC. I let it gestate for a couple weeks before putting it to 3 quarts rye, 8cc each. I didn't test the LC as it didn't show any signs of contams, no cloudiness except for the mycelia settling to the bottom, off color solution or floaters. I let the rye colonize to 25% (or so) then did one shake. As usual it colonized nicely except for the bottom area at which time I gently moved the mass towards the lid and left it upside down for a week or so to let it finish colonizing that area. It seems to help if I unscrew the lid (plastic) a quarter turn to help with GE. I've moved away from the separate lid and hoop for that reason. I've got temp controlled seedling mats that I do all my colonizing/agar/fruiting work on keeping it at 75 F or so depending on what I'm working on.

I use a manure based sub of a 2:1:1 mix of manure, verm, coir in that order along with gypsum, coffee grounds and azomite. For the first time I used 1/4" hardware cloth to screen the manure, I had no idea there was so much wood and stones in there to hide contams. The azomite is an organic mix of trace elements, good or bad it's something I learned from a video. I obtained an electric slow roaster that I do a double boiler method for pasteurization, much better results than oven pasteurization. The spawn to sub ratio was 1:2. One day later I observed hyphal knots poking through the sub and by day 4 the surface was covered. I kept the temp around 78. I could have put it to FC then but let it go to day 9 (Dec 28) before doing that. At that point I started misting and fanning the tub sides and lid 3x a day but the surface got matted and bruised with all the moisture so I increased the fanning to 90 seconds, that helped dry the surface at which point I backed off on the duration. Five days later (Jan 2) I observed primordia on the surface. I think the first pins started showing up two days later. Six days later the harvesting started then ending two days later with a few shrooms showing signs of cracking on the caps.Total harvest for the first flush, 287.76 g wet. With the cracking and the tub feeling light I decided to dunk it for three hours, drained for 1 hr and fanned for another hour to dry off the surface. Probably too much fanning but the surface was seriously blue from bruising. This morning it seems to be recovering.



I used a flash for the pic and it washed out some of the teal color on the shrooms. Sorry, I forgot to add a lighter for context but I'm happy with the size, especially compared to the Treasure Coast from a few months ago. Those were embarrassingly small...

After dehydrating them the total yield for the first flush is 42.35 g. The next decision is whether to separate the caps from stems or leave it as is. There is some evidence on Reddit that each has a somewhat different effect, the caps being more visual and the stems having more of an effect on body load. I can do without the body load... Time for a trial run.

 

Edit: While misting/fanning the tubs I found this in the Amazon:   Mold? contam of some sort?

 

This looks like more primordia in the making: 

Edited by FunnyFarmer, 13 January 2022 - 03:21 PM.

[DocOct]

What are you using as a substraight?

You should be having a canopy of very healthy mushrooms, not to say that you haven't experienced a successful grow. Obviously any mushroom production is a success.

I just feel that you could have more success from a first flush. Try giving straight coco coir as a bulk substraight a try. Eco earth is cheap and effective(1 gallon of boiled water per 1 block of coir in a bucket should do the trick)I really think you could get more production from your effort if you weren't messing around with pH adjustments.

Your shrooms and primordia look really sickly and the mycelium does not look aggressive and happy.

Either way you have experienced success so you are well on your way to full beautiful Canopies and 100% efficiency. Keep growing and learning from your mistakes and always push yourself. You will have more success.

Edited by DocOct, 13 January 2022 - 07:28 PM.

[FunnyFarmer]

What are you using as a substraight?

You should be having a canopy of very healthy mushrooms, not to say that you haven't experienced a successful grow. Obviously any mushroom production is a success.

I just feel that you could have more success from a first flush. Try giving straight coco coir as a bulk substraight a try. Eco earth is cheap and effective(1 gallon of boiled water per 1 block of coir in a bucket should do the trick)I really think you could get more production from your effort if you weren't messing around with pH adjustments.

Your shrooms and primordia look really sickly and the mycelium does not look aggressive and happy.

Either way you have experienced success so you are well on your way to full beautiful Canopies and 100% efficiency. Keep growing and learning from your mistakes and always push yourself. You will have more success.

I use manure based sub, a 2:1:1 mix of manure, verm, coir and the other usual additives, coffee grounds and gypsum.

 

I tried CVG once and wasn't impressed with the results. My problem with it is the lack of a source of nutrition for the mycelia besides the rye. There's nothing in the coir or verm for it to feed on. It's only function is to hold water and furnish a scaffold for the mycelia to grow on or in the case of manure to fluff it up.

 

This is the worse grow so far as to its appearance. I really don't know why its turned out this way. Either too much fanning or misting. I avoid misting the sub as much as possible but even that didn't help when the sub started bruising before it started fruiting.

 

I've got a tub of Argentina in FC growing concurrently with this one and so far it looks OK.

 

I've been growing for over a year and a half so far and have learned so much from lots of resources. I've even come up with methods to help with cultivation. I've gotten pretty good at SAB work including agar, LC and several kinds of transfer methods but really suck when it comes to fruiting. Spawning and letting it colonize is no problem just fruiting.

[FunnyFarmer]

While doing the morning shroom chores I noticed that the Amazon is recovering starting on the ends, nice white mycelia is covering the bruised overlay. I'm continuing with the tub misting and cut back on the fanning, I'm counting on the vent holes to provide enough fresh air for the grow without compromising humidity. I'm beginning to think I was fanning too much especially with a modified tub.