Bulk Mushrooms - Wild Bird Seed Spawned to Horse Manure Mix

[someone else]

Hey all, thought I'd put up a simple little mushroom grow I'm doing with Wild Bird Seed (WBS) and horse manure.

I'm an old hand at growing boomers, and welcome any and all comments, questions, or concerns. I enjoy helping others with their mushroom questions (when I can!).

With these South American spores, I just wanted to see how viable and vibrant they still were. I had 39 vacuum sealed spore prints on foil that are about a year old. Mushroom spores can last many years given proper humidty/temp controls are in place...and minus any light.

I started these South American spores a little over a week ago, and I already have some huge jars of WBS colonizing with fluffy white mycelium. I did have one contam already...noticed some green on the white.

I made a glovebox, sterilized everything (and myself), and scraped a few spores in a few jars of PC'd WB. (PC'd the jars at 15 psi for 90 minutes)...which were originally cooled down for 12 hours after PCing.

The jars won't be completely colonized for several weeks still, even though I have them at about 80 degrees (using a space heater that's serving two functions now).

I'll spawn them to a pasteurized (not sterilized) horse manure mix, and let that re-colonize...then a few weeks after that, take the cover off, and a few weeks after that....mushrooms.

The mushrooms get the moisture for growing by the pasteurized material that's added to the colonized substrate. There is no need for any additional humidity to be added.

Ventilation is achieved by small drilled holes on the sides of the container. A few times a day, I'll take the lid off, and fan the tubs for a minute, then recover, for additional ventilation.

I'll upload some pics in a few hours of what the jars look like.

I've got some great bulk pics from past grows that I'll probably post intermittently throughout this thread. It's sometimes nice to have them to more clearly illustrate certain points.

Again I'm open for questions or comments....and the pics will be coming in the next few hours.

 

[purple stanky]

subscribed
i will be watching intently it
sounds like it should be a good one! =)

 

[klassifyme]

sub'd, i just bought a shroom kit in a box , can i use a few kernals of fully colonized rye tocolonize my own jars, and keep doing that forever or do i need to start from spore every time, im going to try making spore prints anyways but this would be faster? thanx

 

[someone else]

subscribed
i will be watching intently it
sounds like it should be a good one! =)

Well it's just a simple bulk grow...only one large tub.

Last year I ended up with 2 pounds, and that was off of only 2 tubs.

The tub I'll be using is different than last years though, just something I found around the house and it's opaque...which isn't the best for pinning.

Ideally, (IMO) you want a transparent tub, so light can enter to trigger pinning. You don't need much light though, and even the air holes that I've drilled for ventilation work fine for sporadic light.

This grow was merely to test the viability of 1 year-old South American spores. I really half-assed certain parts of this already, although that shouldn't be taken as an indication that this is easy, or that parts of it can be extremely amended.

Growing mushrooms is about sterility when you come right down to it.

IMO, a lack of self, room, and item sterility...and not paying attention to detail...are two of the biggest reasons people fail at growing mushrooms.

I don't wanna sound like a snob though. I mean, I've screwed up a lot along the way. For me, I have to fail a little to learn a lot, and I've done my share of failing...haha.

 

[mojoganjaman]

subscribed...happy boomin'!!!!!

Just a quick peek at my mini-greenhouse... the small cake in the container is just out of a dunk for 2nd flush...I also have 2 more of the big cakes ready to incubate...Z-strain corn to poo/verm...keeps me bizzy when the herb ain't happenin'...next is gonna be oysters and reishi...)

 

[someone else]

sub'd, i just bought a shroom kit in a box , can i use a few kernals of fully colonized rye tocolonize my own jars, and keep doing that forever or do i need to start from spore every time, im going to try making spore prints anyways but this would be faster? thanx

that's a great question!

You can, but then you'll always be in a state of colonization, and at anytime during colonization a contam can spoil the whole pot.

I've heard there are also issues with declining genetics with each generation, just like marijuana. The reasoning behind it is beyond me at the moment....the Sour Diesel has my brain set on forgetful.

If you really want to save the genetics of the mushroom strain you're working with (and don't want to work with spore syringes or spore prints), you'll have to learn about working with agar, working with slants, and cloning.

 

[someone else]

subscribed...happy boomin'!!!!!

Just a quick peek at my mini-greenhouse... the small cake in the container is just out of a dunk for 2nd flush...I also have 2 more of the big cakes ready to incubate...Z-strain corn to poo/verm...keeps me bizzy when the herb ain't happenin'...next is gonna be oysters and reishi...)


View attachment 1297492

Haha, I love those lunch-meat tupperware containers....That's exactly what I used to do with them!

Btw, like your Martha setup...those cakes look really healthy. You're gonna have some explosive pinning.

 

[someone else]

Well here are a few pics of the colonizing jars:

 

[someone else]

I've got video of the sterilization process that I'll provide a link to in a little bit. I probably shouldn't even show it for fear someone will see a step I did wrong and do it....hehe.

I'll just say this: when soaking your Wild Bird Seed, add either 1/4 cup gardening lime or gypsum. It adds calcium to the mix, which helps balance pH and coats the WBS with a "greasy coating" as Lazlo would say. This greasy coating prevents the WBS from sticking to each other.

I'm experiencing this right now with the WBS I'm working with. I didn't add gardening lime or gypsum to my mix. It's not absolutely necessary, as the pics above prove, but the colonization would be twice that had I used gardening lime or gypsum. I noticed one of the jars had a huge block of colonized WBS that I couldn't break apart by tapping.

These chunks are still viable and very useful, it's just that they make colonizing the rest of the jar harder and less likely...from experience.

BTW, I referenced the name 'Lazlo' early. The tek I learned this method from was prepared by an old-time mushroom grower by the handle Lazlo, who you can find on mycotopia.net or through a google search.

"Lazlo's Wild Bird Seed Tek" is used by MANY people, in one various form or another.

PS...ALSO...I didn't use steaming water to soak the WBS in originally. Heat helps break the seed shell down and absorb water easier.... a step I shouldn't have skipped. It'll decrease colonization times if you do.

 

[someone else]

Here's are some of my jars from last year's grow:

Well I decided to not post the sterilization video, because the camera turned almost everything into a blue image. It's an old camera that's been through a lot, so I'm not surprised.

The preparation of the grains, and their subsequent sterilization, are critical steps in getting great results.

Whether I succeeded or failed was often determined by my initial prep of the jars before even bringing spores or Liquid Culture (LC) into the equation.

 

[klassifyme]

that's a great question!

You can, but then you'll always be in a state of colonization, and at anytime during colonization a contam can spoil the whole pot.

I've heard there are also issues with declining genetics with each generation, just like marijuana. The reasoning behind it is beyond me at the moment....the Sour Diesel has my brain set on forgetful.

If you really want to save the genetics of the mushroom strain you're working with (and don't want to work with spore syringes or spore prints), you'll have to learn about working with agar, working with slants, and cloning.

hmmm , im going to have to do some more homework, i havent read about cloning or agar yet.
go badgers

 

[someone else]

hmmm , im going to have to do some more homework, i havent read about cloning or agar yet.
go badgers

Read about Liquid Culture's my friend.

They'll take you to where you wanna go.

 

[klassifyme]

+rep, good info, hopefully ill be covered in fungus

 

[sonar]

Nice I didn't know RIU had much of a myco community. You know I'll be watching this one closely.

 

[purple stanky]

you should do a little more diggin around in the HS forum
there are quite a few of us here that are into mycology =)

 

[redrum83420]

subed. i do bulk also but i use rye grain, my grow is on fungiforum.com.

 

[mojoganjaman]

and a lil' action goin' on...that fat fukker gets cloned when ready...))

 

[redrum83420]

here some pix of one of my first flushes:

 

[someone else]

When working with horse manure, make sure you have pure little nuggets, with as little straw attached to it. You want horse manure that are dry little nuggets. It's ok if they're a little wet; just so most are fairly dry.

Open range manure is what you want. You don't want horse manure that is swept up in the stables, where straw and other unnessaries can gather on the manure (urine,etc).

The horse manure I've acquired (read: 'acquired') is still really fresh. My biggest challenge in the upcoming days is drying these nuggets.

Once the ammonia smell evaporates away, horse manure doesn't smell like anything.

It's actually a pleasant compost/dirt like smell once it's properly dried.

Here are the nuggets I'm drying:

It's not much, but it'll be enough for the two tubs I'll be using:

They're 24.1 IN x 18.3 IN x 24.5 IN. (18 Gallons)

Even though they're opaque, I'll still get normal pinning.

I'll be cutting a huge hole in each lid top, then I'll cover with clear plastic of some kind. It just takes about 20 minutes to do two of them.

The light will trigger the mycelium to start pinning....which is the beginning of the mushroom.

An even pin-set is what is desired, so I can harvest them all at the same time, and then they can be dunked in water for a 2nd, 3rd, and maybe even 4th and 5th flush.

Usually by the 4th and 5th flush, the blocks of hpoo/wbs start using up their nutes, and they start falling apart in a big mess. This is also the time when the spent mix can start growing dangerous bacteria, so these should be disposed of with some care.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.....

The WBS still needs to fully colonize. I haven't checked it since Sunday/Monday, but it was looking good. I'll check it tomorrow or Sunday and update with pics and maybe a video.

I don't like to disturb the jars while they are colonizing, as I may disrupt the very sensitive young mycelium, which is still fighting to take a hold on the WBS as a whole. Once the mycelium has taken over 60-70% of the jar, I feel confident that I've got enough to work with. I have a feeling that most of these jars won't fully colonize (for various reasons I won't mention now), but it really isn't a problem.

If I have a partially colonized jar that will just not finish, when I get a chance to actually make use of it, I clean off all the uncolonized WBS substrate, then add the white mycelium to my pasteurized bulk substrate...for this grow, a horse manure mix.

There are other ingredients to mix together with the horse poo, but I'll get to those specs when we get to that point.

 

[someone else]

Not much to see, although the mycelium is slowly working it's way through the bird seed:

The seed is obviously too dry, yet the mycelium still finds a way to break it down and reproduce. Nature is amazing in its adaptability in surviving less-than-favorable conditions.

The effort level on my part, once again, was very little in setting this all up.

Although I've had success in germinating one-year old spores to produce mycelium, if I would have prepared the jars a little more carefully, the mycelium would be aggressively colonizing the jars.

Anyway, because of the stunted mycelia growth (undoubtedly due to a lack of moisture because of poorly-prepared jars prior to sterilization), I'll probably be 'birthing' these jars in a week or so. I'll then spawn them to a pasteurized bulk substrate, the horse manure mix.

That's the coolest part of the operation, IMO; the pasteurization method. It's simple, fairly clean, and most importantly, it works.

The jars are spawned to the pasteurized bulk substrate (horse manure mix), and are left to re-colonize, sealed up, in the dark, for 7-10 days.

During this critical time, the mycelium (which had been slowly growing on the WBS) is exposed to the moisture and fresh nutrients of the bulk substrate, and it explodes in growth.

At this point, the growth rate of the mycelium is just amazingly fast and aggressive.

Once the mycelium has completely taken over the horse poo mix, it will start knotting a bit, and you'll start seeing the first signs of the mushrooms starting to pin.

That's when the fun begins.