I think it's safe to say that coir is the most popular substrate, praised for it's easy prep and contam resistance.
This has not been my experience. I had tub after tub go green, right at, or before pinning, probably about 8 tubs. To say the least it was frustrating, to say more, it almost made me throw in the towel.
Following normal conventions I figured that it HAD to be my spawn. I found this so strange to have such devastating failure in my jars when 95% of my plates never contammed. Also, I only ever spawned good looking jars and they always smelled fine.
This whole time I was using CVG as a sub, via bucket tek, Bod's cooler tek, or even unbucket tek. In a last-ditch effort I ordered a little package of some pasteurized compost from shroom supply just for shits.
The only spawn I had ready at the time actually did seem a little bacterial too 🤦♂️. So there I went spawning in misery, thinking that it too would soon go green, feeling utterly defeated.
That tub hung around for 7 weeks without a blemish and I eventually tossed it, meanwhile other CVG tubs all continued to go green a week or so in. Could this really just be a coincidence? I decided to start properly pasteurizing my substrate.
I've done 6 tubs now with oven pasteurization. I know the oven isn't everyone's favorite method, but it's the easiest for me without a private yard to work in. I've been using aluminum roasting pans à la Eat's tek. I've been doing a brick of coir with about an equal amount of black kow, with just a tad bit less of verm, a few tablespoons of coffee (😱 contam city!), A half cup of gypsum, and boiling water to hydrate. I make it pretty wet, WAP, wet ass pasteurization 😂, in all seriousness though, I squeeze it and get a good stream 😂💀. The oven slurps up some of the juiciness while baking, it comes out at perfect FC, just a few drops. Seal up the pans tightly with foil and I use a probe thermometer. I aim for 160 for 2 hours.
I have not seen green since, albeit it's still a little early to fully conclude that, 🗣️ YOU HEAR ME FATES? ::knocks on wood:: But so far, more success than I've had in MONTHS and no trashed tubs. Praise be to Yevon!
I really wanted to put this out there for other people that might be suffering. It's such an awful feeling to do all of that work for nothing, then, even more work to bleach out everything thoroughly, just to go stew in sadness when finished with the whole futile process. I also wanted to open a discussion. Has anyone has similar problems? Additionally, I will mention that I only ever used Eco Earth and I was seeing sprouts pop up in my tubs too sometimes. Maybe other brands are far superior.
Thanks for reading y'all, I truly hope this can help someone.
-Xray
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"It says number one son on the license plate. That's me. I'm the number one son." "What about me, Mom?" "You're number one son too"
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I've heard that, it always looked fine to me too, but I definitely saw some sprouts popping up recently. Never saw any of those crystalline formations that others have posted. I am just perplexed by the whole situation, not being a microbiologist and all. Oh well, the best part was that the frustration caused me to build a flowhood. Gonna do some transfers here in a little while in that sweet sterile flow. Oh yeah.
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"It says number one son on the license plate. That's me. I'm the number one son." "What about me, Mom?" "You're number one son too"
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