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Offlinetrampingtrillions
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Registered: 11/09/20
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Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation
    #27201547 - 02/12/21 12:34 PM (3 years, 3 months ago)

Does anybody have any experience with this fungus?

I'd like to try and infect my Three Sisters patch this summer.

There are definitely people out there who intentionally cultivate it.
I was digging through the USDA's NRRL culture catalogue for strain cultures but it looks like anything that isn't a mutant laboratory model organism requires strict import permits as it's considered a crop pathogen.

I would definitely appreciate any leads on where to track down a culture. But I'd also love to hear about any growing techniques. Apparently the traditional method is to dip a blade in a spore slurry and nick young seedlings with it. The fungus infects the whole plant and produces galls on the ears, and sometimes on other parts of the plant. There's a lot of information in the academic literature about what stage of corn growth is ideal to inoculate with spores.

There are some dead threads on this subject from a few years ago but I don't see any users who are still active.

Let me know if this post would be more at home in the gourmet/culinary area. I figured growing obligate parasitic fungi is pretty advanced!


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Edited by trampingtrillions (02/12/21 12:35 PM)

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InvisiblebodhisattaMDiscordReddit
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: trampingtrillions]
    #27201640 - 02/12/21 01:11 PM (3 years, 3 months ago)

Veronica Guzman was working on a method at University of Texas but I don't think they had much success.


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Offlinerud_dudl
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: trampingtrillions]
    #27201742 - 02/12/21 01:52 PM (3 years, 3 months ago)

Hi TT,
I came across this a few months ago, it might be of interest:

https://https://www.jsonline.com/story/life/food/2020/08/31/mexican-delicacy-mushroom-mike-finds-way-cultivate-corn-fungus/3339584001/

What kind of corn are you growing: flint, dent, flour, or sweet? Are you growing traditional varieties? I have thought about trying to grow huitlacoche as well, but don't want to compromise my valuable flint corn harvest or the seeds that I save every year...

R_D

Edited by rud_dudl (02/12/21 01:53 PM)

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Offlinetrampingtrillions
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Registered: 11/09/20
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Loc: Canada
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: rud_dudl]
    #27201861 - 02/12/21 02:52 PM (3 years, 3 months ago)

Thanks for the link!
I was thinking I'd try sweet corn, but I'm open to suggestions. Older heirloom varieties seem to be (in general) less resistant to the fungus. Supposedly Silver Queen (a hybrid sweet variety) is especially susceptible. I love the look and the cultural value of some of the heirloom flint/dent/flour corn varieties but I don't have enough space to really make it worth it to process the crop. I'm just working in my urban backyard, so a small huitlacoche harvest would be a lot more valuable to me than a few dozen ears of corn of any variety. Mainly I just want to try it and see what I can learn in the process.


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OfflineNichrome
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: trampingtrillions]
    #27202251 - 02/12/21 06:14 PM (3 years, 3 months ago)

I'm planting hickory king, white eagle dent, and Amish butter popcorn this year.


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“Drink your tea slowly and reverently, as if it is the axis on which the world earth revolves - slowly, evenly, without rushing toward the future.”
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Offlinetrampingtrillions
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Registered: 11/09/20
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: Nichrome]
    #27202346 - 02/12/21 06:53 PM (3 years, 3 months ago)

Awesome! That white eagle dent corn looks beautiful. Popcorn is a good option for small plots I suppose, each cob probably cooks up to a decent bowl of popcorn.

Are you hoping for a huitlacoche infection or no? :grin:


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OfflineNichrome
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: trampingtrillions]
    #27202373 - 02/12/21 07:05 PM (3 years, 3 months ago)

It would be cool to see and if I did I'd surely try my hand at capturing and taming it. My intention is to grow food, feed, and enough substrate for a year of cult. I do pretty well with corn as a spawn and have intentions of eventually becoming sustainably self sufficient with mushroom cultivation. I don't like having to buy import stuff or rely on international shipping for basic ingredients. I have three plots to use that do not share wind so I can get away with 3 corn plots. I'll be planting three sisters plots and tending everything by hand. There is room for 20 acres of planting total but I'll probably only do around three or four.

Spawning corn to shredded cob is the plan.

A good friend might bring me Tuscarora white corn seed as well as their heirloom beans which may replace the hickory king corn. Might just have to get some more land to grow more varieties of corn.


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“Drink your tea slowly and reverently, as if it is the axis on which the world earth revolves - slowly, evenly, without rushing toward the future.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh

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Offlinetrampingtrillions
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: Nichrome]
    #27202495 - 02/12/21 07:53 PM (3 years, 3 months ago)

That's great! Good thinking. I didn't consider the utility of the cobs and stalks, too. My other fungal gardening goal this year is to get some Stropharia rugosoannulata growing on my garden/yard waste. I collect my neighbours' bagged leaves in the fall and use them as garden mulch as well, so I have plenty of biomass to compost.

3 or 4 acres by hand is very impressive! That will be a lot of food, I'm sure. Congrats. With that much space I'd guess you actually probably have a decent chance of huitlacoche just showing up. My 3 sisters plot was going to be more like 150-200 square feet... haha.

I have a bunch of pole beans I've saved over the years but their names are lost to history. For squash I have Long Island Cheese, Red Kuri, and Blue Hubbard. I just dug through my seed stash and it looks like I actually do have a small packet of corn seed, looks like popcorn... but I have no idea where they came from. Better to start fresh. Last time I tried 3 Sisters was years ago and I didn't have much success gardening back then.


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Offlinerud_dudl
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: trampingtrillions]
    #27203101 - 02/13/21 06:28 AM (3 years, 3 months ago)

Hi TT, I can appreciate your position (urban backyard etc). Good luck with your Three Sisters garden and with your Ustilago experiments. :smile: R_D

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Offlinerud_dudl
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: Nichrome]
    #27203113 - 02/13/21 06:42 AM (3 years, 3 months ago)

Hi Nichrome,
White Eagle Dent corn is gorgeous - a work of art. How close are your corn plots and have you tried growing (and saving seed from) multiple species before...if so, any cross-pollination issues? I pretty much stick with one variety per year, to keep the seed stock "pure". I have some Tuscarora white corn seed coming this year as well from a seedkeeper friend. The cobs can get super long and it is supposed to be one of the best flour corns going. I mostly grow traditional flint corn varieties, never tried the kernels or cobs for mushroom cultivation but the dried cobs (minus the kernels) make excellent tinder.

I was thinking of trying some kind of intercropping with Stropharia rugoso-annulata and the Tuscarora white this year. I've been growing King Stropharia for a few years and would like to see if, as Stamets suggests, it increases corn yield.

R_D

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OfflineNichrome
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: rud_dudl]
    #27203600 - 02/13/21 12:33 PM (3 years, 3 months ago)

Kings surely make my cukes and squashes grow like crazy. I have two locations that do not share wind as well as another field across a tree line where the popcorn will go. From my understanding popcorn does not cross pollinate with dent corn very easily so a hill and a treeline should suffice. The two dent corn plots are about a quarter mile from each other but there is a forest and a large hill between (500 foot difference in elevation and the wind generally comes from different places. There is a certified organic Amish farm about a mile down the road where they grow corn but the wind doesn't generally come from that way and they grow an heirloom dent over there anyway.

I'm hoping to keep my lines as clean as possible but would not be hurt if I ended up with my own land race over the years. I'm starting out with good corn so if it melds it should still be good corn..

The Tuscarora corn will get it's own plot for sure no matter where I have to put it. I know farmers here with space. My friend bringing it is married to a lady from the turtle clan and I guess they have been the keepers for the duration. He says he's seen cob up to 3 feet long! I'm also getting a recipe for their corn soup (they cook for 3 days with oak ash). It is very good.


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“Drink your tea slowly and reverently, as if it is the axis on which the world earth revolves - slowly, evenly, without rushing toward the future.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh

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Offlinerud_dudl
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: Nichrome]
    #27203948 - 02/13/21 03:51 PM (3 years, 3 months ago)

Quote:

Kings surely make my cukes and squashes grow like crazy.



That's good to hear, I can't wait to give it a try maybe with inoculated straw (rather than chips). I have them growing around a Forsythia. The Forsythia with S.R.-A. is doing way better than the other Forsythia (without Stropharia rugoso-annulata) but...a sample size of two, growing in different conditions makes comparisons meaningless.

From what I understand 1/4 of a mile is the minimum distance to avoid cross-pollination. Growing two different coloured corns can also help to ID crosses if you are saving seed (e.g. Bloody Butcher and Tuscarora white). Have you encountered Native Seeds Search? https://https://www.nativeseeds.org/products/sss008They sell tassel and silk bags to ensure reproductive isolation. I was thinking of making something like what they sell so I can grow out multiple varieties this coming season.

I nixtamalize my flint corn (but not for 3 days), it tastes better and is more nutritious. I find traditional corn soup a bit bland, but a some bacon or smoked pork helps the flavour.

R_D

Edited by rud_dudl (02/14/21 04:57 AM)

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InvisibleAndyHinton


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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: rud_dudl]
    #27205188 - 02/14/21 09:53 AM (3 years, 3 months ago)

I've also been looking for a culture. The closest I got, in a PM convo years ago, was instructions to inoculate the corn with broth just as white tufts start to appear on the young ears.


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Edited by AndyHinton (02/14/21 09:55 AM)

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Offlinetrampingtrillions
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Registered: 11/09/20
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: AndyHinton]
    #27205479 - 02/14/21 12:44 PM (3 years, 3 months ago)

I'll let you know if I come across any. I just read some of your journal, very interesting stuff, particularly that Pleurotus-cultured mead. This DIYbio community is awesome. FYI there is a Flammulina velutipes culture available in the NRRL catalogue, not sure what your security ethos would have to say about ordering cultures straight from Uncle Sam!

I have also seen a number of sources that recommend squirting a bit of LC into the ear of corn as the silks appear.


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Edited by trampingtrillions (02/14/21 12:59 PM)

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OfflineLennybernadino
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: trampingtrillions]
    #27217637 - 02/20/21 11:48 PM (3 years, 2 months ago)

4 sisters becomes 6 sisters!

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Offlinekkkkkkf
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: trampingtrillions]
    #27255837 - 03/16/21 04:07 PM (3 years, 2 months ago)

I think you may have some success planting an heirloom corn like the maiz morado from baker creek in some sub-optimal soil. The sub-optimal would leave the corn more susceptible to becoming infected. From there you can isolate and culture as you would anything else.


Additionally it would help, maybe, to have someone else within 1 mile that is also growing corn in a neglectful fashion.

That is what happened to me two summers ago.


You may also be able to revive a culture if you go to the different latino grocery stores where they sell huitlacoche. Perhaps hydration could help? Treat the whole infected kernel like a spore print?

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Offlinetrampingtrillions
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Registered: 11/09/20
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: kkkkkkf]
    #27256333 - 03/16/21 09:27 PM (3 years, 2 months ago)

Well I'll at least be growing corn this year, so I can hope I get "lucky". I was given some Hopi Blue which I think is what I'll plant.

My understanding is that huitlacoche is harvested before it sporulates, so you might not be able to get spores from the stuff at the store, but you never know. It might be possible to clone some tissue though. I've never seen it available as a fresh product in my area, only canned.


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Offlinetrampingtrillions
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: trampingtrillions]
    #27578004 - 12/11/21 08:48 PM (2 years, 5 months ago)

Bit of a late update to this post, but I did in fact get lucky this year, and the huitlacoche gods blessed me with fungus!! It was growing out of the tassels of 2 of my Hopi Blue plants. It had already sporulated by the time I noticed it, so I didn't get to taste it but I put some spores to agar and I saved some of the spore-laden galls for future use. If I end up intentionally inoculating my plants next year I'll post a journal about it.


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OfflineMegaCrouton
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: trampingtrillions]
    #27580657 - 12/13/21 11:01 PM (2 years, 5 months ago)

Quote:

trampingtrillions said:
Bit of a late update to this post, but I did in fact get lucky this year, and the huitlacoche gods blessed me with fungus!! It was growing out of the tassels of 2 of my Hopi Blue plants. It had already sporulated by the time I noticed it, so I didn't get to taste it but I put some spores to agar and I saved some of the spore-laden galls for future use. If I end up intentionally inoculating my plants next year I'll post a journal about it.




Did you happen to get any pics? Curious to see :smile:

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Offlinetrampingtrillions
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Re: Huitlacoche/Corn Smut/Ustilago maydis cultivation [Re: MegaCrouton]
    #27581675 - 12/14/21 09:47 PM (2 years, 5 months ago)

Definitely!

Growing from the tassels:


Up close:


On agar:


A sample of that agar growth under the scope (didn't record the magnification):


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