Spawn to Bulk

I want to capture a little bit of the process of how I'm spawning grain to bulk. I am by no means an expert on any of this, and I welcome feedback and notes - but at the same time, I've had a pretty steep learning curve, and some of the stuff I've figured out comes from a variety of sources, so I want to have it all in one place that I can point to and reference. And, hopefully, improve as time goes by. 

I start with wide mouth quart jars with these lids. They've got self-healing injection ports and syringe filters for gas exchange, and I like the fact that they're plastic and sturdy. I've tried some that were made from flat metal lids, and they just didn't feel as nice. I know "didn't feel as nice" is a really superficial judgment - but I'm the one handling them, and the tactile sensations of how things feel in my hands makes a big difference for me.

These jars were inoculated two weeks ago with liquid culture. Liquid culture is mycelium in a low-nutrition solution that stores and ships well; it exists in the same legal loophole as spores, because it doesn't contain any of the active alkaloids that are prohibited by most of the relevant laws. It's shipped in a syringe, and you use a needle to inject it into the jar through the injection port in the lid. Because of the loophole, it's not a problem to get them shipped by mail, although some companies have difficulty getting their credit card payments processed. These Stargazers came from Nichy Myco; I have also gotten syringes of liquid culture from Inoculate the World and Myyco. 

In the first picture of the jar, it's clear to see that every grain is completely covered by mycelium. It's called full, or 100%, colonization. This is important; it means that the mycelium's immune system will prevent the grains from being invaded by mold, bacteria, or yeasts that they encounter once they're exposed to outside air. The popcorn has been soaked overnight, cooked for forty-five minutes, dried for forty minutes, then jarred up and pressure sterilized. After being inoculated, the jars are shaken up three times - once when I inject the liquid culture, once at 30% colonization, and once at 70% colonization. Shaking helps to distribute the mycelium around to all the grains in the jar, and makes sure that any contamination hiding in the center of the jar is exposed. 

Now the grains get their final shake. It's kind of disheartening - it looks like two weeks worth of growth is gone in thirty seconds of rough agitation. You can still see the white fuzz on some of the grains, but just barely. Popcorn is MUCH easier to shake than oats. 

I am using a six-quart shoe-box Sterilite tub. It will start out single-height, and as the mushrooms start to grow, I'll add a second one upside down on top to serve as a humidity dome. I use a liner; I'm trying out these trash bags, because I got a huge amount of side pins with clear grocery store bags. It was awesome to watch the mycelium colonize through the clear plastic, but a pain in the butt to harvest the side-pin mushrooms. I'm following (mostly) Bod's Bucket Tek for coir substrate. I pasteurize the coir with boiling water in an Igloo cooler, allow it to sit overnight, and then adjust the moisture for proper field capacity. I got the coir on sale at PetSmart. I start by adding a quart of the hydrated coir to the lined tub. 

The grain goes in next. This is the first time in two weeks that the jar has been opened, and the mushroom smell is very strong. It's a good opportunity to check to see if the smell is right - anything sickly sweet, yeasty, musty, or sour is a bad indicator. It should smell like mushrooms. There's a very specific smell that these Psilocybe cubensis mushrooms have. The corn itself has a slight starchy sweet smell, but it's overpowered by the mushroom smell of the mycelium. 

Another quart of coir goes on top of the grain, and then they get thoroughly mixed together by hand. 

It ends up looking like dark chocolate cookie dough with butterscotch chips. 

A trick I picked up from someone on Shroomery is the hamburger press. I smooth and gently but firmly compress the substrate with the grain to make the surface flat and even; it makes it more likely to have a consistent level of humidity across the tub, and it helps create optimal conditions for a better pinset. It also makes the harvesting much easier, because the "ground" is much firmer and easier to separate the mushrooms without it pulling up. 

I add an additional pint (half as much as the volume of grains) of coir to serve as a casing; this helps to retain humidity and encourage best growth of the mycelium through the substrate. At this point, it looks like it's ready to plant seeds for garden plants. 

One forum member said they tuck the liner down around the edges instead of trimming it off with scissors. Trimming with scissors is a PAIN IN THE BUTT, so I'm trying the tucking method this time. I used a little flat tool that's basically the same shape as a butter knife. 

Because some of my earlier efforts had serious problems with retaining sufficient moisture, I add a covering of Press-and-Seal plastic wrap with a few ventilation holes punched in it, and then put the lid on. It's not "sealed" by any means - but it reduces the moisture loss. 
 

And then I take the label off the jar, and put it on the side of the tub, so that I know which tub has which grain in it. I didn't realize that I gotten the photo of the tub from the other batch - I put up one tub of Stargazer, one tub of AMVP. They're both from Nichy Myco. The original date was when I inoculated the grain; the SENT date was when I sent it to substrate. Hopefully in another two weeks to a month I'll get to make a post about harvesting!