I was ordering my seeds for my garden and noticed a button mushroom kit. Wife wanted to try it so what the heck I ordered it. Got a nice crawl space under back of house that fits criteria perfect. Kit was 30 some bucks, but oh well I hope they work out! Good old Gurney seeds gets me to over oder once again!
anybody ever done a mushroom kit?
tips? advices?
__________________ Most of my life I've spent hunting,... the rest of it I've just wasted
Cross,
I've been looking at these myself. I did a search on "growing mushrooms" and got quite a bit of info on them (both the edible and the other type). They offer several different ways of growing and many varities to choose from. The kits look pretty easy but I am interested in using the "plugs". These are wooden dowel plugs (like you get w/build it at home furniture) that have the spore of choice smeared all over them. Drill holes in a newly cut hard log, tap in the plug and seal w/cheese wax. This style takes about a year to produce. Make sure that when your kit is done producing you throw it on to a old compost site or any other good shroom site and they may give you another crop the next year. I'll be interested to hear how yours turn out.
^ thats the kit we ordered. We got the white giant kit for 31.99 I will spread the compost for sure! I wonder if I should just spread it down in the crawl space when its done? The soil down there stays damp but not wet pretty much year round, not too hot, not too cold.??? My first venture into mushrooms so it will be interesting.
Afixer... the magic will happen the first stir fry I make with em'! LOL I'm too old for the funny ones anymore! Left those days with the college! LOL plus I'm fresh outta psychadelic posters and dont have a black light!
__________________ Most of my life I've spent hunting,... the rest of it I've just wasted
I've grown many tons of oyster mushrooms. A bit complex but once I developed a pattern and fine tuned things a bit I could hardly keep up with them. Tasty, too. Developed a sensitivity to the spore thru prolonged contact to high concentrations which led to shutting down the operation. Too bad. Had it dialed.
At a hobby level, with a little care, once you get going you can do a perpetual re-inocculation of fresh substrate (wheatstraw) with existing mycellia (the hairlike roots of mushrooms) and not have to buy any more kits for awhile.
Snowshoe, where did you grow them? Would my crawlspace be a good idea?
Wheatstraw... so, after several harvests out of the box kit would you recommend taking the box apart and adding the wheatstraw to the compost from the box?
details please! LOL
__________________ Most of my life I've spent hunting,... the rest of it I've just wasted
LOL...HA HA Cross Hair...I being older (?more mature?) you may not need the old pyscho-illusions parapanllia..and get the rush... but all kidding aside never quite had the special spot for them... luck
I may be older now... I'm not so sure about more mature! LOL
Bad stuff is just too hard on the body nowadays! Hank Jr was right about the hangovers hurtin' more than they used too! The strongest thing I do anymore is kool-aid or mt dew!! LOL
I hope the crawl space button mushroom grow works out! I enjoy quirky little things like that! I was into hydroponics, built my own system and it grows plants like a champ... I'm just a tinkerer with stuff like this,,,, its a hobby where you get to eat your creations... dont get much better!
__________________ Most of my life I've spent hunting,... the rest of it I've just wasted
Maybe it is just because it was on a commercial level but i remember at my aunt's in Oregon they had a mushroom farm were the cultivated them and i will tell you i will never forget that smell. but if it works power to you, i love me some mushrooms.
__________________
Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way. - General George Patton Jr
Hey Cross Hair. Sorry slow getting back to you...out of town overnight.
I wouldn't recommend oysters in the crawlspace...they will colonize damp wood. Don't need to have them eatting your house!
The process is longer to write about than I should post here.
You (and anyone else interested) can email me private at thewetfrog@nctv.com and I'll be happy to get back with a condensed process outline. If it looks like you want to continue I'll gladly get into details for you.
It's a bit of a process - what isn't (LOL) - but if you like mushrooms it's satisfying and if you have a viable outlet/buyer can be profitable. They do need to get to market quick (fancy restaurants are ideal) as the shelf life is limited. They do dry well tho...which is how I handled my over-runs.
