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Morbility
Cybernetic Psychonaut

Registered: 12/04/18
Posts: 166
Loc: Ilus IV
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Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? 1
#26512671 - 03/02/20 11:17 AM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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I've been learning this stuff for a bit over a year now and haven't yet had a successful run. If I had to narrow things down to one area that I struggle with, it'd be getting moisture content of things dialed in right. I read until my eyes want to fall out, look over teks, and do my best to follow guidelines, but still need to develop a feel for the "salt to taste" aspect of this hobby that only comes with time and experience.
The past week I've been doing some thinking after getting some assistance in another thread and it got me wondering: Everyone was new to this at some point. What were the things that got you frustrated/you struggled with the most? What concepts do you still have difficulty with? What's positively contributed to your growth as a cultivator? What drove you to keep going despite setbacks and failures?
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A.k.a
Stranger



Registered: 10/27/19
Posts: 16,782
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: Morbility]
#26512679 - 03/02/20 11:24 AM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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Damn man a year with no successful grows??
I just started in October but went hard right off the bat. Definitely learning the surface conditions and coir prep which like you said only comes from doing it over and over. I started like ten shoeboxes my first time and made them all very differently to see what worked and what didn’t. My main lesson was they needed to be much drier than I thought going in. I think I still tend to make the coir too wet cuz I rarely have large shrooms.
Once I started agar it was all about spawn. I’m still learning what good spawn looks like, it’s taken a long time but I’m much more confident now.
I have no idea how people grew before sites like this. It would’ve taken me a lifetime to learn as much as I have in a few months through the people and resources here.
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LAGM2020     
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cronicr



Registered: 08/07/11
Posts: 61,436
Loc: Van Isle
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: A.k.a] 1
#26512718 - 03/02/20 11:58 AM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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lol when I started the internet was on computers and only spoiled fucks had it so I printed instructions off at the local library for pf cakes and aquariums with drip shields and got a money order made to send off to get spores, took 3 no the for everything to arrive and 24 hours for me to fuck it all up and have to start over. one step at a time one foot in front of the other and a detailed grow plan logged here and you can't go wrong, these guys won't let u fail.
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  It doesn't matter what i think of you...all that matters is clean spawn I'm tired do me a favor
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Morbility
Cybernetic Psychonaut

Registered: 12/04/18
Posts: 166
Loc: Ilus IV
Last seen: 1 year, 7 months
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: Morbility]
#26513174 - 03/02/20 04:26 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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@A.k.a: Yeah, a year plus now. I decided "go big or go home" and went straight into bulk methods. In retrospect I would've been better off doing what you did and use shoe boxes for some smaller scale side-by-sides. Live and (hopefully) learn. Maybe for my next round I'll try that out so I can further develop my intuition. Agar kicks major ass though, I started off doing things on petris and it gives so much more flexibility than the old ms "stick n' squirt" techniques.
@Cronicr: The halcyon days of card catalogues, the scratched up CD of Encarta if you were lucky, a random copy of The Anarchist Cookbook on floppy, and ISDN at the library. I remember them well. Three months to wait to fail and then hit the reset... fuck man, you must've been seeing red! I definitely need to migrate my offline journals up to here for some peer review when I get the time.
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Sockadin



Registered: 01/03/10
Posts: 7,244
Last seen: 2 months, 20 days
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: cronicr]
#26513182 - 03/02/20 04:30 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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This is the same for me...College library printed Tek for PF. Flushed fruits on first go around, but I lost 1/4 of jars to contamination. SGFC was used and my buddy brought me the syringes he traded some dude who wanted some weed.
Edited by Sockadin (03/02/20 04:30 PM)
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Asura
Cyantist


Registered: 08/01/11
Posts: 5,047
Loc: Texas
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: Morbility] 4
#26513194 - 03/02/20 04:35 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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My #1 rule is ABC. Always Be Cultivating.
Start your next grow a week or two after your current grow. And keep doing it. You get more practice in and if something goes wrong, you don't feel like stabbing yourself in the neck, because there's another grow right behind the failed one that you gotta worry about.
That might be a run on sentence.
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PrimalSoup
hyperspatial illuminations



Registered: 11/17/09
Posts: 13,568
Loc: PNW
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: Asura]
#26513200 - 03/02/20 04:40 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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--------------------
if you stand too close to the machine it'll start to eat youPrimal's simple tested teks and projects: Wheat Prep 2.0 Acidic Tea Tek Potency Project!
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mushboy
modboy



Registered: 04/24/05
Posts: 32,273
Loc: where?
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: PrimalSoup]
#26513210 - 03/02/20 04:46 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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Getting started?
Lack of consistency with guides/users. I'd ask 1 question and get 10 different answers from 10 different people.
I also had trouble getting my mom to mist my trays when I was at work. Little did I know my setup was hands off only I didnt know it yet
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Ignorantape
Mycophile


Registered: 01/30/20
Posts: 149
Loc: The Indigo Plateau
Last seen: 3 years, 1 month
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: mushboy]
#26513375 - 03/02/20 06:24 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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Great idea for a thread.
I'm certainly not an experienced grower but I'll third the ABC line of thought. It takes a few extra minutes to make extra plates and jars. That way if something doesn't work I've got spares to fall back on and if it does work I've got plenty of material to experiment with. Other than that I've just got to learn how to properly organize and catalogue all of those grows and experiments. I'm getting there slowly.
And thanks to all the TCs who posted. What you guys do is amazing!!!
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Morbility
Cybernetic Psychonaut

Registered: 12/04/18
Posts: 166
Loc: Ilus IV
Last seen: 1 year, 7 months
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: Ignorantape]
#26513489 - 03/02/20 07:27 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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Loving all the responses so far everyone! The age and combined wisdom of this forum still amazes me every time I log in and poke around. Being able to access the sum of human knowledge from a device in my pocket is a far cry from how things used to be. I remember pre-internet and dial-up days, yelling at family members to absolutely not pick up the phone so I could download a copy of Doom over 56k. How far we've come in so little time.
I feel spoiled with the info here compared to what some of you have contended with. Keep the stories coming!
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feldman114
Stragler


Registered: 09/06/19
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Loc: Bravos
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: Ignorantape]
#26513524 - 03/02/20 07:57 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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Not an experienced grower, but it’s been a long road so I’ll add my 2c
At first, I was EXACTLY 50% sure each of my spawn jars was clean. The more I looked at myc, the more it looked like mold and vice-versa.
Also, I’m a bit OCD, and I gotta say picking out ALL the sunflower seeds out of 14qts worth of WBS was a challenge as well.

Right now I’m struggling with getting even pinsets - where 90%+ of fruit mature at the same time on 1st flush - even with clone cultures, though I only tested 3 so far lol...
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SynKyd
ctrl-alt-delite



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Posts: 1,554
Loc: ૐ
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: feldman114]
#26513551 - 03/02/20 08:21 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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Awesome thread idea!
Just to give you some encouragement and maybe some different ideas, I am not highly experienced but had some great bulk runs in my first year growing (2013-14 when the internet was easy.......)
had success the first few runs doing all the wrong things (paying for jars and bags sterilized) and they quickly ramped up. Found that as a beginner having a lot of different irons in the fire will help. it doesn’t do any good to g2g 50 quarts if it all came off one wedge that wasn’t clean. After a long break I’m remembering what works, slowly.
Also I started using small jars for my first wedge drop so I could get many options going and try lots of different things, and didn’t feel guilty playing mycology Darwinism. You don’t have to try and fruit every attempt if it’s going poorly just detach from the failures quickly and focus on what’s going well, and in the summer throw shit in the yard it may work out.......and makes mowing the grass like an Easter egg hunt.
I can get 32 wide half pints in my pc at one time for agar no pours OR grain starter jars. I have a lot of half pint jars in my mix.
Some shit isn’t for everyone either, pouring agar is hell on earth to me thus far. I still have 50 dishes to figure it out with but pretty sure I’m walking away from that quickly. Figure out what works for you and keep working at that-
-------------------- New inclusive poop emojis from Apple!
   
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eatyualive
Eat's You Alive :)



Registered: 08/17/01
Posts: 19,026
Loc: In Your Head
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: SynKyd]
#26513575 - 03/02/20 08:40 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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When I started it was all dial up. There weren’t many teks. It would literally take 20-45 minutes for one image to load. When that happen, you figure shit out on your own lol
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shroomgirl645
Microdoser extraordinaire 🍄😊🍄



Registered: 12/03/19
Posts: 151
Loc: The Shroom Shack
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: A.k.a]
#26513620 - 03/02/20 09:10 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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yeah, RIP OP. I thought I was a failure for taking 6 months to get my first harvest
-------------------- New to Shroom Cultivation | Current Status: Tubs 3/5/2020 1&2 (Fruiting)
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eatyualive
Eat's You Alive :)



Registered: 08/17/01
Posts: 19,026
Loc: In Your Head
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: shroomgirl645] 1
#26513650 - 03/02/20 09:39 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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Morbidity if you are having contam issues it may be your culture work. Spawn may look clean but if you see contams pre first flush it’s your spawn.
So once I tossed 60 tubs to green. Straw tubs 
What kept me going is that I’m stubborn as fuck snd will not be defeated by the mean green. I had to kick its ass!
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cronicr



Registered: 08/07/11
Posts: 61,436
Loc: Van Isle
Last seen: 2 years, 7 days
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: eatyualive]
#26513755 - 03/02/20 11:01 PM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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Quote:
eatyualive said: When I started it was all dial up. There weren’t many teks. It would literally take 20-45 minutes for one image to load. When that happen, you figure shit out on your own lol
And 3 days to get a response lol
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  It doesn't matter what i think of you...all that matters is clean spawn I'm tired do me a favor
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Morbility
Cybernetic Psychonaut

Registered: 12/04/18
Posts: 166
Loc: Ilus IV
Last seen: 1 year, 7 months
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: eatyualive]
#26514029 - 03/03/20 06:19 AM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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Holy shit, eatyualive, 60 tubs!? That had to have been painful. My spawn game has gotten better since starting: invested in SFDs and abandoned the poly-fil (totally worth it). Went overkill on my prep methods too since the oats in my area are total garbage. Lots of wasted jars smelling like moonshine and looking like melted ice cream getting to my current stage of "I hope the damn tub fruits this time." I want to get a proper microscope at some point so I can see the sources of these headaches, if only to make eye contact and cuss at them... though 9/10 times bathroom mirrors are cheaper and more accurate for that 
Even still, lots of work to continue improving ahead. Different levels of grain moisture works better for different people, sight and smell as you indicated don't always give adequate clues, playing around with different teks to see if something works better for me, etc.
Stubbornness and obsessiveness are almost required traits for the people that do this work. It's awesome to have access to a place like this with intelligent, like-minded people!
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MadHatter333
We Are All Mad Here

Registered: 09/20/17
Posts: 4,650
Loc: Your Mom’s Rabbit Hole
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: Morbility]
#26514284 - 03/03/20 09:37 AM (3 years, 10 months ago) |
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I started with cakes. Had two miserable failed attempts that cause a mold outbreak.. my friend got me into it and left me on my own to figure things out. Finally on my third attempt I got good growth in my jars. It took me a while to get the basics down. I was determined though and made it work because I really wanted to master PF tek.
Since then I have grown pounds of fungus and am now doing agar after a long break. I can do wbs oats and so much more now. I also have PF tek under my belt so I can help noobs out with that and more advance stuff.
Just got to keep pushing. Everyone has set backs, just got to get back on the horse and ride.
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TEKs I Like
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Morbility
Cybernetic Psychonaut


Registered: 12/04/18
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: MadHatter333]
#26558853 - 03/26/20 10:24 AM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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*Bump*
Lots more new people posting since the world outside is going to shit. Let's hear some more stories to encourage the novices among us.
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Sockadin



Registered: 01/03/10
Posts: 7,244
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: Morbility] 1
#26558868 - 03/26/20 10:33 AM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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I started with cakes and a TIT. Oh how much we all learn.
I think for me the real breaking point in clean spawn was good agar work but really grain prep. I would get sloppy with my grain prep and have contamination pop up its head.
Clean up grain prep, no more contamination.
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Morbility
Cybernetic Psychonaut


Registered: 12/04/18
Posts: 166
Loc: Ilus IV
Last seen: 1 year, 7 months
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: Sockadin]
#26558905 - 03/26/20 10:44 AM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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Grain prep and clean spawn are the holy grail of getting good bulk results. I use oats, but the ones in my area are dirtier than a $5.00 hooker. At least now that we're all stuck indoors I have time to do my typical 4 hour PC cycle at 19 PSI without interrupting the rest of my life.
"I love babysitting my PC!" Said nobody ever.
Edit: Anybody want some ice cream? 
Edited by Morbility (03/26/20 10:49 AM)
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Kimble
Idiot

Registered: 03/08/18
Posts: 508
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: Morbility]
#26614170 - 04/20/20 01:01 AM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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When i started ten years ago, if was normal to use a spore syringe straight to grain. So i had trouble with bad spawn. Only it would take me a month to realise and then another to prepare more.
These days i tend to make things too wet.
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rumfor69
Bodhicitta Cultivator



Registered: 08/05/11
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: Kimble]
#26614439 - 04/20/20 06:12 AM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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Beginning...Affording the right equipment weighed against the possibility of success.
Years later...having enough space for tubs 😈
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FrankRhizo
Interdimensional Travel Agent

Registered: 11/28/17
Posts: 295
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Re: Experienced Cultivators: What was your biggest challenge getting started? What is it now? [Re: rumfor69]
#26614475 - 04/20/20 06:48 AM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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I'm novice at best but learning what clean spawn looks like then learning when to pitch suspect jars. When I doubt throw it out. ABC so throwing out plates, jars, and tubs isn't that big of a deal. It's already been said but persistence, patience, and enough different cultures to have success at first.
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