UK Shroom Growers Diary

I've never grown any plant. In fact, the last simple houseplant I attempted to look after died a sad and horrible death. Although it's rumored that I once successfully cultivated some cress seeds grown in damp cotton wool in primary school, this last lingering memory of horticultural greatness has long since faded. I've never taken mushrooms before either, the thought of munching some toxic shroom by mistake has always put me off picking my own or getting any from anyone else. I know nothing at all about mushrooms, growing them, eating them, storing them, the legal issues surrounding them, their active chemicals, chemistry in general, technical botanical terminology, indeed I know absolutely nothing at all about anything mildly related to mushrooms; other than the fact that you can buy some in Tesco but there not the ones that make you trip.

So why the hell am I writing this? I've taken LSD for many years now, but where I live in the south of England acid has never been an easy drug to obtain, and it's relatively expensive. So I've finally decided to find out about mushrooms and grow some. In this document I present a journal of my experiences in moving from knowing nothing about mushrooms, to harvesting my first crop.

Tuesday 7th July 1998

Today I would start the hunt for shroom information.

After a few quick web searches with AltaVista, my first stop was The Lycaeum where I obtained The Magic Mushroom Growers Guide and The Psilocybe Mushroom FAQ. I would be so bold as to suggest that you go there now and read them, they are two invaluable documents and much of this journal will be meaningless to you if you don't. They are an absolutely essential read. I learned that The Magic Mushroom Growers Guide was an elaboration of a cultivation technique outlined in another document named PF TEK, which is available at Psilocybe Fanaticus. I found this document very useful to cross-reference information.

I discovered that a good way to start growing mushrooms (you will also know this, as you have just read the documents I've mentioned) was to obtain a syringe containing mushroom spores. I noticed that I could order syringes from Psilocybe Fanaticus but they charge $10 for the syringe and $10 for international shipping, plus being based in the USA the poor spores would have to travel half way around the world to get to me... less than ideal I thought. Via The Lycaeum I found a company called Smart Botanics who are based in the Netherlands and who only charge $4.95 for international shipping and $8 for the syringe. From their web site I ordered a single syringe of Psilocybin cubensis spores; listed in their catalog as a PFE Syringe. The total cost of my order was $12.95 (US Dollars) about £8.00 (UK Pounds).

Wednesday 8th July 1998

Today I decided to try and obtain some of the equipment I would need to follow the directions in the Magic Mushroom Growers Guide, into the city center I went!

My first stop was a health food shop (Healthy Pulses) who stocked Brown Rice flour. The packet didn't actually say Brown Rice, simply Rice but the shop assistant assured me that is was indeed the flour I sought. This cost 80p for a 500gram packet, not bad I thought, and brought 4 packets.

Next I dropped into Lawson's, a hardware store, hoping to pickup some 1/2 pint canning jars. After several minutes of chatting to the bemused shop assistant I learned that the terminology used in all the American documents, (The Magic Mushroom Growers Guide, PF TEK, etc) referring to jars will get you nowhere in the UK. What you want to be asking for are "1/2 pint or 280ml preserve jars with screw-on lids". The shop assistant did eventually grasp what I was rambling on about and pointed them out to me. Unfortunately not only were they square jars with round openings, but they all had huge shoulders, i.e. the opening at the top of the jar had a smaller diameter than the body of the jar. You can't squeeze a large square mass through a small round hole, which I would have to have done to eventually remove the rice cakes if I had purchased these jars. In fact not only were the jars useless but they were £2.19 each which I thought was a bit steep when I needed ten of the bloody things! I did however pickup a Hydrometer (gauge that measures the air humidity) for £2.95 there, and a thermometer for £1.50

I searched for much of the day in vain for a suitable jar. No joy. I must have asked in at least twenty different shops!

I decided to try and get some Vermiculite instead; the stuff that would eventually be mixed with the brown rice flour to make a suitable substrate for the mushrooms. My first stop was Do It All, the hardware store/garden center, where I was greeted with a blank stare. "Vertmic.. Vermac... what?" was all I managed to squeeze out of the shop assistant. One thing I did learn was that I was incredibly uneducated about this mysterious Vermiculite substance that I was trying to purchase. The Magic Mushroom Growers Guide hadn't prepared me for the question, "What is Vermiculite?", or "What is it used for?" which I was asked by the shop assistant. I felt incredibly stupid trying to explain to the shop assistant why I was trying to buy something for which I didn't even know the use or even remotely what it was!

I had better luck purchasing Vermiculite in B&Q, the garden center/hardware store. They had a 10 liter bag of the stuff for £3.15 and knew instantly what Vermiculite was. To be specific I brought "J.Arthur Bower's Silvaperl Vermiculite - Horticultural Grade." Just in case you have a problem finding the stuff and need to explain to someone what it is... Vermiculite is commonly used to mix with compost to aid the germination and cultivation of plant seedlings. It holds many times it's own weight in water and claims to absorb nutrients and then release them slowly to the plants roots.

Still though, I had no jars! On the way back from B&Q I popped into Sainsbury's, the food super store. After thoroughly exploring the entire super store I made a remarkable discovery, the perfect jar! If you go into Sainsbury's and ask for French Conserve (it's a jam basically) you will get a jar with no shoulder and exactly 1/2 pint capacity for only £1.15! Make sure you get the 340 gram jar. Half the price of the preserve jars in Lawsons and this jar had bloody jam in it! I brought some instantly.

So that was that. I had everything I needed to start the mushroom process, just waiting on the delivery of the spores. Would they ever arrive? Here's a breakdown of what I brought, where and how much it cost.

Not bad, £30 for everything I needed to get started in the world of Magic Mushrooms!

Thursday 9th July 1998

I received an email from Smart Botanics today saying my credit card had been declined by the credit card company, I had to re-order the PFE Syringe with another credit card... more waiting.

Friday 10th July 1998

I decided today that clarifying the legal issues surrounding these mushrooms would be a good idea, off to the library I went.

The Misuse Of Drugs Act 1971 lists Psilocin as a Class A controlled drug. Psilocybin is not listed as a controlled drug although "any compound structurally derived from tryptamine or from any ring-hydroxy tryptamine by substitution at the nitrogen atom of the side chain with one or more alkyl substituents but no other substituent." is deemed to be a Class A controlled drug.

"On conviction on indictment" of a Class A drug you can be given an unlimited fine, life imprisonment, or both.

However, we are not synthesizing pure chemicals here, we are growing fungi! There is a difference suggested in the Act between plants and pure chemicals. "Any plant of the genus Cannabis" is explicitly ruled as illegal, likewise for Opium Poppies. This indicates that the only two plants containing Class A drugs that are to be treated as the Class A drug they contain are Cannabis and Opium. Similarly the cultivation of these two plants is explicitly ruled illegal. This leads me to believe that other plants/fungi containing Class A drugs are not illegal, nor is their cultivation. Lets take Morning Glory for example, the seeds of which contain Lysergic acid amide which is listed as a Class A drug but the plant can be grown in your own garden or house perfectly legally.

Bottom line. The cultivation of Psilocybe cubensis mushrooms (or any other mushrooms) is not illegal in the UK. If you start extracting the active chemicals from the mushrooms, that's when you run into legal problems. All of course, in my humble opinion.

Tuesday 14th July 1998

Received an email from Smart Botanics, saying they will ship the spores tomorrow. Cool.

Sunday 19th July 1998

Still waiting for the spores.

Found another potentially useful document on the Net today, http://mindweaver.home.ml.org/shroom/excult.html, An Experiment in the Home Cultivation of Psychedelic Mushrooms. Written by Dojah in 1995, it is a journal document just like this one, detailing his/her mushroom growing experience; although it only starts from the day of spore inoculation. This document originated in Canada.

Monday 20th July 1998

The spores arrived today! Smart Botanics said they received verification of my credit card details on Wednesday 15th July, which means that the spores only took 5 days to arrive after payment had been received. Excellent service, fulfilling their promise that they can deliver anywhere in the world in under 10 days!

The package came in the form of a very sturdy, sealed cardboard tube, padded inside with polystyrene insulation. There were no markings on the tube indicating it's contents; for those given to a paranoid nature. Inside the cardboard tubing the syringe was also contained within a heat-sealed polythene bag, I suppose this aided sterility and also guarded against leakage. The contents of the syringe were completely clear save for a slight shade of pink around at the point where the needle screwed onto the syringe body, and a few tiny black particles floating free in the solution.

I removed all the jam from the preserve jars, and soaked the jars in a sink full of hot water to remove the labels. Then I began to follow the steps detailed in the Magic Mushroom Growers Guide. First I punched four small holes in each jar lid with the aid of a panel pin and a hammer. After completing all the jar lids and examining the diameter of the syringe needle I decided that the holes I had made were too small! I used the tip of a corkscrew to make each hole slightly larger, when I had finished each hole was about 1mm in diameter.

Next I mixed my substrate. I deviated from the Magic Mushroom Growers Guide here, in that I used the ratios of vermiculite to flour detailed in the PF-TEK Update. The formula was 1/2 a cup of vermiculite, 1/4 of a cup of brown rice flour and 60cc of water, per jar. I found myself wondering what size of cup I should use. First of all I decided to try a small cup [240cc volume] and mixed enough for what I thought would be 8 jars (i.e. 8 times the amount of everything). I found that with this small cup the resultant substrate had a very smooth texture, not runny, but fairly damp and very dense. It only made enough to fill 4 jars, which I labeled 1 to 4. Next I tried a larger cup [300cc volume], and multiplied all the amounts by 4, hopefully creating enough substrate to fill 4 jars. The result was a slightly less damp substrate with a more grainy texture, but still there was only enough to fill 3 jars, which I labeled 5 to 7. Finally I tried a larger cup [310cc volume] and used heaped cupfuls. I multiplied the amounts by 2, hoping to make enough substrate for the remaining 2 jars. The result was a distinctly chunky texture and I did actually manage to fill 2 jars with it, which I labeled 8 and 9.

Estimated number of jars to be filled	Volume of 1 cup	Jar's labeled
8	240cc	1,2,3 and 4
4	300cc	5,6 and 7
2	310cc+	8 and 9

I cleaned around the tops of the jars with damp toilet paper, topped each one up with 1/2 an inch of vermiculite and sealed the lids tightly. Next I covered the top of each jar with tin foil, crumpling it around the lid as indicated. I fetched some large saucepans and butchered a tea-towel, cutting it into three pieces one to be placed at the bottom of each saucepan to shield the jars from some of the more direct heat from the cooker ring. When I came to put the jars into the saucepans I realized that I didn't have enough space, I didn't have any more saucepans so jar number 4 and jar number 7 stayed out. Once the jars were in the pans (resting on the remnants of the tea-towel) I filled each with water so the level came half way up the side of each jar, popped on the saucepan lids and turned on the heat.

Whilst I was juggling the heat of each cooker ring (trying to get/keep the water at a slow boil) I had time to reflect on how much of my stocks I had used. I found that I had used just over one packet of the brown rice flour, each packet being 500g. I disposed of the rest of the partially used packet as I thought once opened, it probably wouldn't last too long, and at only 80p a packet, who's counting? I had also used quite a substantial amount of the 10 liter bag of vermiculite, there was still a lot left however, the bag was far more than half full, but all the same I was glad I had opted for such a large bag full! In fact, on the subject of vermiculite... The PF-TEK Update mentions the size of the grains of vermiculite being used, just so you know, the vermiculite I was using ranged in grain size from as little as 1mm to as large as 8mm.

Once the jars had been boiling for a little over an hour I turned off the heat and removed them all, placing each on the kitchen work surface, where I left them to cool.

Tuesday 21st July 1998

Time to inoculate the jars! Today is exactly two weeks after my first ever thoughts about growing mushrooms!

I removed the tin foil from each of the jars, took the cap off the syringe and inoculated the substrate through each hole on each one of the seven jars. One thing I did have difficultly with was the size of the holes I had made in the lids! The needle didn't want to squeeze threw some of them, and it often took quite a hard shove to get it through. Next time I shall make the holes in the lids 2mm+. This left me with about 3cc of solution left in the syringe so I replaced with cap and put the syringe in a dark cupboard.

I noticed that the Magic Mushroom Growers Guide and the PF-TEK documents didn't quite agree on what I should do with the jars next. The PF-TEK indicated that the holes should be masking taped over, whereas the MMGG didn't mention tape at all. In the end I decided to go with the PF-TEK and covered each hole with sticky tape.

I placed the newly inoculated jars in a dark cupboard at 70 degrees F and left them.

Monday 27th July 1998

I noticed today that on each jar a small speck of mycelium had appeared at or close to each jar's inoculation sites. These specks ranged from 2mm to 8mm in diameter.

I also moved the jars to a slightly warmer cupboard today. The temperature had been hovering around 70 degree F (+- 3 degrees F). The new temperature is around 75 degrees F minimum.

Being optimistic I thought I had better start finding out where I could get the bits and bobs I needed for my terrarium. Not being sure whether to opt for an ultrasonic humidifier or the basic spray-gun approach, I decided to call around and get some prices on ultrasonics. I found the most helpful and most highly specialist company in the UK to be J S Humidifiers who are on 01903 850200. I had a long chat with a chap there about my requirements and he said he would send me a catalog and some prices in the post. Excellent.

Thursday 30th July 1998

Got the quote from JS Humidifiers today... Just under £2000! Obviously a very high-end industrial quality device. I decided to look around for alternatives.

I found that a newly discovered technique for humidification was to use a substance called Perlite. It's not mentioned in the PF-TEK or MMGG as these were written before the Perlite discovery. I got hold of the Perlite Humidification FAQ and a few other documents via The Lycaeum. It looks like the way to go.

I purchased a 24" x 12" x 12" fish tank today, this cost £18.98 from a local pet shop. Probably not the best bargain in the world but reasonable. I also purchased a 10 liter bag of Perlite from B&Q, it was just next to the Vermiculite and cost £2.99.

With a view to drying the mushrooms I also brought some tupperware containers, some wire mesh and some Calcium Chloride.

Saturday 1st August 1998

Had some free time today so I decided to prepare my mushroom drying chambers. I took several tupperware containers and cut a piece of wire mesh just slightly larger than the area of the base of each container. Cutting the mesh took an absolute age! I think a purchased too thick a mesh for my rusty old wire cutters. Once I had the small pieces of wire mesh I folded the edges of each piece down to form table-like legs, so that when placed in the tupperware container there was a gap beneath of about 1". I filled the bottom of each container with some Calcium Chloride, just enough so that the wire mesh was still about 1/4" above the chemical. Eventually the shrooms would be placed in these containers on the mesh to dry, but for now I sealed all the lids and put the containers in a cupboard.

Thursday 28th August 1998

The jars are still, for the most part, only 50% colonized today. I began to worry. I thought that the fact that I had completely sealed the jars by taping-up the holes might be preventing growth, so I posted a message into alt.drugs.mushrooms. Sure enough, the general consensus was that air should be able to enter the jars. Bollocks! I removed all the tape. I hope the mycelium recovers.

Sunday 6th September 1998

Removing the tape from the jars made an incredible difference! Some of the jars are now practically 100% colonized. Next time, I won't tape up the holes!

Tuesday 8th September

Time to prepare for birthdays!

Brought a 6 foot by 2 foot sheet of 2mm perspex from Do It All today, to make a drip shield and a terrarium lid, it cost £9.99. At the same time I picked up a little hand sprayer for £1.19.

I've decided to go with the perlite method but still use a dual chambered terrarium setup. Hopefully the best of both worlds.

I emptied some perlite into the terrarium just to find out how much I would need to use to get a one inch deep layer. Then emptied in back out again into another container.

I thought I would get everything ready for the terrarium today. I cut the perspex up to make a lid for the terrarium and a drip shield. I have a very limited tool set and had to use a Coping Saw! Not recommended, it took ages to cut the bloody stuff! I got there in the end tho... I also cut out a few little squares of perspex for the cakes to stand on in the terrarium. Then I dumped all the perspex, the hand sprayer, and a jug into the terrarium and filled it with 10 gallons of water (ie. full) and a load of Milton sterilizing solution. I had to put the terrarium in the shower to fill it as I didn't have a hose or anything.

After half an hour I used the jug to scoop out most of the water so the terrarium was light enough to lift and emptied the remaining water out. It then had a very good rinse! Good job I decided to put it in the shower, ideal for rinsing!

I also baked the perlite in the oven at 220 degrees C for 1 hour to sterilize it.

Finally, into the terrarium went the perlite, followed by the small squares of perspex for the cake bases, the drip shield and the lid. I wrapped the lid several times round with cling-film just so when it rests on the top of the terrarium it makes a good seal.

Thursday 10th September 1998

Today jars 5 & 6 went into the terrarium! A bit overdue really as both jars had baby shrooms growing in them. Jar 5 had a fairy large mushroom growing halfway down the inside edge of the jar! The cakes came out of the jars quite easily as the MMGG had said they would. After birthing each cake I dabbed them with loose tissue paper to pick up the excess moisture they had picked up when they came out of the jars.

One of the mushrooms in jar 5 got damaged as the cake was birthed, I'm debating weather to remove the squashed mess.

Just to recap, here's a list of everything I have brought for these mushrooms sake:

Friday 11th September

Today jar 8 went into the terrarium! I picked the squashed mess of jar 5, hope it's OK.

Saturday 12th September

Cakes 5 & 6 seem to be doing OK. They each have quite a few baby shrooms growing from the base of the cake. Jar 8 still looks cool too.

Tuesday 22nd September

Well, things seem to be going OK. All the jars are in the terrarium now, except jar number 1 which I forgot about and it now has a rather unpleasant green growth on it.

Jars 5 and 6 were the first to fruit, closely followed by jar 8. I have harvested approximately 11 grams (almost dry weight - see below) from them. Although jar 8 was rubbish compared to jars 5 and 6... just a few small shrooms and then it quickly turned blue and shriveled.

Jar 6 went a bit blue and shriveled too, but at least it produced a nice crop of shrooms first. With jar 6 I decided to try a little experiment though. I had read in a few places that you place the cakes directly on the perlite to breath life back into them, so I tried it. Within a few days jar 6 had turned fluffy again and is now once again covered in fruiting mushrooms. The shrooms nearer the bottom of the cake are huge bloated monsters! As placing the dried cake on the perlite worked so well, I have placed jar 8 onto the perlite now and placed jar 6 back onto a little perspex stand. Jar 6 stood on the perlite for 3 days in total.

Jars 2 and 3 are now covered in developing shrooms, as is jar 9 to a lesser extent.

The reason I say almost dry weight above is that I had a nasty accident with my calcium chloride (don't ask). I can't get any more of the stuff yet so I'm using a fan to dry the shrooms. Seems to be working fairly well, the smaller shrooms snap when bent but the larger ones are still a slightly elastic.

THE END - Tuesday 12th January 1999

Well, in the end everything turned out rosey! In total the six jars that I cultivated produced 26 dried grams of mushrooms.

I dried all the mushrooms using a fan in the end. I have a 12 inch fan which I suspended above a piece of wire mesh on to which I dropped the shrooms as I picked them off the cakes. To store the mushrooms a used a large jar which has a rubber seal around it's lip. I filled a small cup with Calcium Chloride and covered the cups opening with a piece of fabric held in place with an elastic band. I then placed this cup at the bottom of the large jar and simply dropped the mushrooms into it when they were completely dried by the fan. I found that the fan drying process takes a couple of days with the fan on 24 hours a day.

As far as dosage goes, I found that 1 gram of my dried shrooms was around about equal to 1 paper trip, this is obviously very approximate and very subjective. Anyway, in the end I settled on 3 gram doses.

I did the last of my shrooms on New Years Eve so I'm about the order another spore syringe from Smart Botanics, I did think about taking a spore print, but then for all the hassle it could cause, is it really worth it when a spore syringe is only eight pounds?

I had read in a lot of places that the mushrooms taste terrible. I found this to be untrue (again very subjective). When the mushrooms are fresh I could happily eat them all day, they have a nice mellow mushroomy taste, as you would expect. When dried however, the mushrooms are significantly more difficult to get down. They are hard, taste bad and smell bad, ucckk! I found a good way to get down the dried shrooms was to mix them with cold baked beans, when I did this I could taste nothing but the beans. I also tried mixing them into a glass of water, NOT a good idea!! They swell up into a mushy slush and STINK!!

Well, I had fun growing the shrooms and taking them. And if nothing else this document has proved that anyone can grow magic mushrooms easily, with just a little expense and a small effort.There are several links to other web documents within this journal and due to the nature of the web some of them, by the time you read this, will either have vanished or will have changed. I have taken the liberty of taking copies of the most useful of these documents and making them available. This is useful in that you have access to the versions of the documents that I was working from when I grew my mushrooms and wrote this journal, who knows what changes have been made to them by now!The author of this document can be contacted at any of the following addresses if you should wish to do so:

Note: for the web site - click on the picture, then type "shroom" in the box and click on the ZOOM button, don't just type shroom and hit the Return key.

EMAIL:	mindweaver@technologist.com
WEB:	http://surf.to/mindweaver

• Information
• Comments