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Mushrooms, Mycology and Psychedelics > Mushroom Cultivation
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Vermiculite Granulate.... I hate you
    #11225069 -

Hi,

Some of you may remember my post from some time ago. http://www.shroomery.org/forums/showflat.php/Number/11123990#11123990

I inoculated 20 BRF jars with P. Cub Amazonian, and waited 2 weeks with no results in any of the jars. I however, rationalized  that perhaps it was actually the tape I used that messed up the batch. So I decided to try it again with masking tape.

I also decided to split the batch into 4 groups based on water consistency and source: Soggy, Normal, Soggy + Pond Water, Normal + Pond Water.

However, still haunted by the fear of failure again, I ordered normal verm and did a separate group of 8 Jars. However, this second group did not vary in water consistency, and I used pond water for all of them. I also used the B+ print for them.

Please note also, I am not stingy with spore solution. I drop 1cc-2cc per jar.

All in all, this was a 28 jar experiment.

http://gallery.me.com/vurstp#100008/Shroom%20Factory

I am happy to report, vermiculite granulate is virtually useless and will hinder or in my case ruin your batch.

It has now been 8 days with the Amazonian's, and no growth has been found in any of the 20.

However, it has now been 4 days with the B+ prints using the normal verm and colonization has been rapid. Every jar has large and clear growths.

So here I stand, 60 euros wasted on syringes, 7kg of vermiculite granulate, and three weeks of my time wasted.

I'm not too upset about the verm though, because I was planning of using the verm for a hydroponics project as well. I also use the large verm for my filter layer with the BRFs. So although it was not a total loss, it was a hard lesson learned: DO NOT USE LARGE VERM UNLESS YOU KNOW SOMETHING I DON'T AND YOU CAN MAKE IT WORK.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Vermiculite Granulate.... I hate you [Re: Spency]
    #11225097 -

Is pond water like a name brand filtered water?

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Vermiculite Granulate.... I hate you [Re: skeezers]
    #11225100 -

After spore injection, ddid you put it in complete darkness first for about week? I know mycelium doesn't grow above ground naturally usually. I like to inject against the glass so I can see it start growing.

Edited by CapHat (10/11/09 05:05 AM)

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Vermiculite Granulate.... I hate you [Re: CapHat]
    #11225115 -

I seriously doubt that vermiculite ruined your jars.  It is used as a water resevoir for brown rice flour (or your grain of choice).  The medium and coarse grades work just fine, and either actually works better than fine grade as it makes the cake airier, which supports better gas exchange during colonization.  Generally jars do not colonize because of too much/ too little moisture, improper sterilization techniques, or dirty/bad syringes.

As far as your contamination barrier, you want very fine vermiculite, which allows the least air through it unfiltered.  You can grind the coarse or medium vermiculite for that purpose.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Vermiculite Granulate.... I hate you [Re: MLBjammer]
    #11225151 -

Unlucky mate, 60 euro fucking hell!

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Vermiculite Granulate.... I hate you [Re: CapHat]
    #11225175 -

CapHat said:
After spore injection, ddid you put it in complete darkness first for about week? I know mycelium doesn't grow above ground naturally usually. I like to inject against the glass so I can see it start growing.



I colinise all my jars in the presence of light from the very start. Jars colinised in light, then spawned to manure, and my mini dub tubs exposed to light during colinisation.


The only effect ive ever seen is faster pinning after full colinisation. Light has no effect on germination or colinisation.


--------------------

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Cakes can and will pin! - So you think cakes suck for pins. Your wrong
Franks Simple Coir/Verm Tek
Franks Proper Pasturisation Tek
Franks Spawning To Bulk - Monotub
Professor Pinheads RTV Injection Port Tek
Foo Mans No Soak WBS Prep Tek

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Re: Vermiculite Granulate.... I hate you [Re: MLBjammer]
    #11225303 -

MLBjammer said:
I seriously doubt that vermiculite ruined your jars.  It is used as a water resevoir for brown rice flour (or your grain of choice).  The medium and coarse grades work just fine, and either actually works better than fine grade as it makes the cake airier,


Agreed. I don't know how big this stuff is, but I use big chunky verm and it is ok.


--------------------
You make it all possible. Doesn't it feel good?

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Re: Vermiculite Granulate.... I hate you [Re: Doc_T]
    #11226793 -

In all fairness it could very well have simply been that print. Like I said, I did the separate 8 with normal finer verm and saw rapid colonization - but I used a different print.

I'm astounded though that out of 20 jars, there has been no growth. This is my second time doing a 20 jar batch with the strain as well. I'm going to let them sit for a while, and see if anything pops up though.

@ Skeezers: No. By pond water I literally mean pond water. I went with a bucket and grabed some out of a local pond near my home. I heard the organic properties in the water really helps with mycelium growth. So far, I have not had issues with contamination.

@ Caphat: Granted the jars have not sat in pitch black for the entire week, but the only light exposure has been simply me coming into the room to look at the jars or do something else. Otherwise, they sit in pitch black for a majority of the day.

@ MLB Jammer: My idea behind using large verm as a filter was so that the mycelium has more access to oxygen. In any case, the jars I'm using are quite large (450ml) so the filter is about 2-2.5cm tall. That should be ok right?

I thought larger verm held less water? They are definitely more airy, but like I said I experimented with water levels, so moisture is definitely not the issue. My guess is the large and inconsistently shaped verm screws up the displacement of water and rice.

Speaking of which, the verm is not only large, but size and shape is extremely inconsistent. Perhaps is could be a reason?



-EDIT- Just for giggles, heres what the setup looks like:


In any case, my last batch of 8 using finer/normal verm has begun colonization very fast and so for the sake of my wallet, I think I will avoid using the larger verm for future mushroom projects. This is though unfortunate because I have a bath tubs worth of it, but what can you do... :-(

Edited by Spency (10/11/09 02:20 PM)

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Re: Vermiculite Granulate.... I hate you [Re: Spency]
    #11226828 -

tap water works fucking awesome. i dont know why you would go to a pond to get water..anything you heard about pond water growing better shrooms is merely a myth. i mean it all gets sterilized anyway.


--------------------
ephemeral anomalous

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Re: Vermiculite Granulate.... I hate you [Re: prismism]
    #11226882 -

Well I wasn't sure so I just wanted to try it. I didn't use pond water for all of them, but I was curious to see if it would help so I did half of them using pond water.

My logic was that although they are sterilized, the water still holds lots of organic properties that the mycelium could probably feed off of in addition to the rice. It wasn't much effort to go get the water anyway, I just grabbed it on the daily walk with the dog.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Vermiculite Granulate.... I hate you [Re: Spency]
    #11226956 -

Keep trying man

you still have all the materials around...and its definitely not large verm that is causing you any problems, the verm I use has very large chunks and I made 20 pf jars on Sept 22 and each one is growing well and I only had one contamination (the first time I ever grew I only had 2 jars make it out of 8)

just follow each step exactly, don't skip anything and you'll have no problems

try try try

you'll get it eventually


--------------------

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
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Mushrooms, Mycology and Psychedelics > Mushroom Cultivation
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