OK, Here?s my tek. I think that the biggest advantage is that it doesn?t need a sterile environment. It works in open air and hotel rooms
It?s difficult to get the equipment that is specified in a lot of the tek?s from the US and after having wasted money on foggers, thermometers, thermostats and hygrometers. I?ve ditched the gadgets and got the whole process condensed down so that it?s simple and fast. I?ve given British suppliers ?cos the US ones are well covered on the site.
Shopping list.
Pressure cooker. (The only expensive item you need) ?20 Argos
Syringe/pipette/dropper for measuring in 1/2ml increments
Bottle of 3% (10Vol) liquid peroxide. (the cream is for hair, not shrooms)
Natural popping corn. (supermarket or health food shop)
Clear organic honey
Purified or distilled water. (the type you put in an iron or car battery)
Perlite. (B&Q, Homebase or garden centre)
Vermiculite. (B&Q Etc.)
(optional) Peat free/coir based multipurpose compost. (B&Q Etc. comes in solid bricks).
Micropore surgical tape from the chemist.
(optional) Agar. (From Chinese food shops or health food shops).
Fine mist spray bottle
You also need
Glass Jars with metal lids that will stand up in the pressure cooker but any shape is fine. Big ones for the Popcorn and little ones like pate or baby food jars for the cultures.
Sterilize all equipment by fully dipping it into neat 3% H2O2 (peroxide) and shaking off the excess just before each use. Anything that comes into contact with your cultures should be wet with peroxide. Try not to cough or move too fast when you?re working and infection won?t be a problem.
Peroxide (H2O2) is just water with an extra molecule of oxygen. It?s harmless at this strength but wear gloves to avoid white fingers. Always use fresh peroxide and never pour any back into the bottle.
Put 500ml of distilled water and 50ml peroxide in a new fine mist spray bottle. Use this to spray work surfaces and surrounding area and for misting your casings.
Peroxide saves all the paranoia about sterility
Part 1. Making the culture
(1) I assume that you have a fresh mushroom. If you have a spore syringe or print, go straight to part 3.
(2) Grind up 15gm of corn in a coffee grinder/pestle and mortar/between 2 rocks. Fine as you can
(3) Add ground corn to 150ml tap water
(4) Add 1-2 gm honey
(5) Bring mixture to the boil then add 4gm agar (If you can?t get any you just have to keep your cultures upright and still)
(6) Stir over heat until the agar has dissolved
(7) Pour into large jars or a glass vessel with a spout so they are 2/3 full, put foil over the top and pressure cook for 40 mins.
(8) Clean up. Get your space as clean as you can. Spray area with peroxide/water include ceiling.
(9) Get your smaller jars (clean and dry). Add a dash of neat peroxide to each one, put the lids on, shake ?em , open ?em and throw out the excess, put the lid back on. Stand them upside down. If there is any visible fizzing, either your jars are dirty or the lid has gone rusty.
(10) Wait ?till the jars of corn agar have cooled down to the point where they feel comfortably warm but not started to set. If it does set, warm it up a bit in a pan of water.
(11) Carefully lift the foil lid from the culture medium and squirt in 1% of peroxide. (my jars contain 200ml each so I add 2ml), stir with spoon (dipped in H2O2) If there is a lot of fizzing, the medium was too hot and the oxygen will have been liberated and the H2O2 is now water. Wait a bit longer and have another go
(12) Take the lids off the small jars keeping them upside down so that any excess peroxide stays in the lid. Line up the jars and the lids, and then pour culture into the jars to cover the bottom (5-10mm deep). Flick any excess H2O2 from the lids and screw ?em back on the jars.
Now you?ve got your culture jars. You can store them in the fridge for a few months. If you didn?t use agar, avoid slopping the culture up the sides of the jars.
Part 2. Cloning
(1) Get a fresh mushroom. This will work if they are a bit dried up but not mouldy.
(2) Cut a section from the stalk, preferably from the bottom where it is more solid. Peel of anything iffy looking with a razor blade.
(3) Put your section into a dish of neat H2O2 (it will fizz). While it?s submerged, cut it in half down the length and then cut out a bit of tissue from the inside of the stalk. Use the corner of the blade to transfer this to a smaller dish of H2O2.
(4) split your bit of tissue into tiny strands using 2 pins.
(5) Do one Culture jar at a time. Take off the lid, use a pin to transfer a few strands to the center of the medium. Put the lid back on.
(6) Put the cultures somewhere warm and dark. After 3 days you should see white fuzz where you put the strands. After a week you should have a fuzzy, white mat. This can take longer for the first few generations while peroxide resistance builds up.
Part 3. Feed the fungus
(1) Measure out 1 jar of popcorn for every 3 jars you want to fill. Soak it in lots of cold tap water for 4 hours ? overnight.
(2) Cook it in lots of water in the pressure cooker for 35 mins. Drain excess water.
(3) Bang holes in the tops of your jars with a screwdriver. One 5mm hole in the centre is best. Hammer or squish down rough edges.
(4) Put Micropore tape over the hole, (Top of lid, Duh!) Better still, poke a wad of Polyfil pillow stuffing through the hole.
(5) Fill the jars ? full with the cooked, drained corn. Screw the lids on, cover with foil and put in the pressure cooker for 1 hour. If you leave the foil on when they are cold, you can store them for months in the fridge.
Part 4. Infection
If you use a spore syringe, dab the tape with surgical spirit and inject through the tape. Cover with fresh tape. Don?t use peroxide until the jar is colonised
(1) Clean your area, spray with dilute peroxide. Take foil off popcorn jars, get your culture jar ready, spray outside of jars with peroxide.
(2) Loosen the lids of the popcorn jars but do not take them off.
(3) (I hold my breath for this bit!) Do one jar at a time. Take the lid off the culture jar, scrape a piece off the fungus mat with a coffee stirrer dipped in H2O2 (Go for the strandy, ropey bits)
(4) Lift up the lid of the corn jar. Just lift it enough to flick the culture in and put the lid back down straight away.
(5) When all the jars are done, lift the lid once more just enough to squirt in a bit more peroxide. (1/2ml in a 300ml jar) I use a fine syringe so it sprays the surface of the corn.
(6) Screw the lids down tight and give them a good shake.
(7) Put the jars in a warm, dark, clean place.
Part 5. Colonization
(1) After about 3 days, you should see a few of the kernels have a white fuzz surrounding them. (Spore infections can take up to 2 weeks). Give the jars a good shake. Put them back in the dark.
(2) 3 days later the jars should have a good marbling of the white mycelium. Give it another good shake.
(3) 4-6 days after the jars should be fully colonized with mycelium and become a solid clump. Time to case them.
Part 6. Casing
The containers for your casings should be dishes or bowls with well fitting lids and should not have transparent sides. Small foil roasting dishes are great. 2 jars of corn fill one dish about 40mm deep
You can prepare the casing mixture in a large batch and keep it as long as you like, so long as it is kept closed. The advantage to using coir is that you can see if the mixture is damp enough by it?s dark colour. If you?re a good gardener and know what ?damp? means, it?s ok to just use vermiculite.
(1) Chip a clump (about 30gm) off the brick of coir based compost and pour hot tap water on it so it becomes wet soil.
(2) Double it?s volume with vermiculite (or just use vermiculite) and add more water. The mixture needs to be damp, not wet. If you squeeze a handful hard, a few drops of water should run out.
(3) Put it in a closed but not sealed container. Foil baking or takeaway trays with lids or glass dishes or roasting bags, suitable for one of these options.
Either; Microwave for 9 mins/ Pressure cook for 40 mins/ oven at 250C for 40 mins. Leave it to cool
(4) Line up the containers and give them a light spray of dilute H2O2.
(5) Open your casing mixture. If it feels dry, dampen it with the spray.
(6) Shake one or two jars to loosen the kernels (depending on your container size). Open it and dump the contents into a container. Shake it to level it out then spoon casing mixture over it 20-30mm deep. Give it a light spray and put the lid on. Put the containers somewhere warm for 48 hours.
You can save a few infected kernels and use them to infect fresh jars and bypass all the agar work. It?s a good idea to make agar cultures of each generation. If you get a good one, you have it?s genetic material.
Part 7. Fruiting
The fruiting chamber needs to be large enough to give your mushrooms space to grow an allow light to enter, at least from the top. It should have a well fitting lid and be watertight. Plant propagators without holes in the trays are ideal. A plastic crate with foodwrap over the top OK too
(1) Pour a 30mm layer of perlite in the chamber and add tap water (with 1% bleach is good). The perlite needs to be soaked and there should be about 5mm reservoir of water on the bottom of the container. Level it out.
(2) Take the lids off the casings and put them on the perlite. There may be mycelia visible on the surface of the casings. Put the lid on the fruiting chamber.
(3) The casings need light, at least 2 hours a day. Normal room lighting is enough, not direct sunlight. The mushrooms just need to know which way is up.
(4) The casings need air, take the lid off once a day and use it to fan fresh air into the container.
(5) The casings need moisture, if there are water droplets forming on the lid of the chamber you are ok. Otherwise mist with the spray after fanning.
(6) Comfortable room temperature is fine. The shrooms will emerge in 2-6 weeks
(7) Harvest shrooms just before they open or as soon as the veil begins to tear. Twist them out from the base, try not to take too much casing mixture with them. You can pick them individually if they mature before the others but when the bulk of them are ready, pick all of them out of the casing. The casing will have shrunk but if it feels dry, give it a spray. Check for signs of green mould and throw out any infected containers. The casings should flush again in two weeks and a third or fourth flush is possible but the yield gets lower.
(8) Take the best shroom and clone it (Part 1) or make a spore print.
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Use Popcorn Your shrooms will love you back!
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