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InvisibleLyleChipperson

Registered: 09/29/23
Posts: 61
First grow GT PF Tek * 1
    #28486462 - 09/29/23 07:07 AM (3 months, 28 days ago)

I'd like to document my first grow experience as I've never grown anything before. The goal is to have a log I can look back on for reflection and get feedback from other users.

I am doing a PF tek. Finding 1/2 pint jars was impossible in my location, and almost all available jars here get narrower towards the top. The only suitable option was 225 ml cylindrical jars, so the cakes are a bit smaller.

The grow room is my kitchen, which was very dirty before I thought of doing this. It's old and it needed renovations but I don't consider my place a permanent living location so I didn't want to deal with it.

In order to get the room ready I took out anything non-essential, taped up the windows with plastic as there were some small gaps that allow dust and small bugs to get in, and started cleaning the floor daily with a bleach solution, along with spraying all surfaces with a disinfectant. Left slippers in the room that will never be taken out so I don't wear any outside shoes while I'm there. Sprayed the inside of the cupboard where I put the jars with disinfectant several times. Brought in a picnic table as a work surface which was also sprayed with an alcohol + h2o2 disinfectant and another one with more chemicals in it. The day before the syringes arrived I got some antibacterial and antiviral disinfectant fumigation cans, sealed the door as best I could and lit a can to hopefully clear out any mold, bacteria or other possible contaminants from the room.

I got a pressure cooker which fits exactly 12 jars with a small plate on the bottom to keep the bottom jars from touching the metal.

Yesterday I started the process. I had to grind my own brown rice into flour as I didn't get the flour I ordered delivered on time.

Then I washed everything that will be used, all the bowls, the jars and the lids. For the mixing part I used gloves that I sprayed with disinfectant after putting on.

The mixture needed 2 additonal 1/4 cups of water to achieve proper consistency and there was a lot left over, as the amounts were calculated for 1/2 pint jars. Next time I will make 2/3 of the total mixture. Added a 1 cm dry layer of verm on top, and 2 layers of aluminum foil over the lids.

Pressure cooked for 1 hour, then I took the jars out about an hour after opening the cooker, and left them on the table to cool off quicker. After about another hour they were at room temperature so I started preparing for inoculation. I took a shower, new clothes, put on gloves, sprayed disinfectant on the gloves and on my arms up to the elbows, and put on an n95 mask and a looser fitting mask with a carbon filter in front of it. I used a big gas torch for sterilization. 1 jar was soaked with excess water from the pressure cooker and I discarded it. The other 11 looked OK.

At this point I prepared the syringe and noticed something that could mess the whole thing up. I didn't want to unpack the needle beforehand and it seemed smaller through the packaging. The holes I put in the lids turned out to be not wide enough to fit the needle. I thought about my options and decided to take the chance and open the lids for the inoculation, as I didn't want to waste my whole day of effort up to this point and I have enough syringes for 3 more attempts.

I sterilized the needle between each jar and tried to work as quickly as possible once I opened the lid. I ended up using a bit more than 10cc for 11 jars as it took me a bit to get used to applying very light pressure to the syringe.

Once all the jars were done I put them in a container which was placed into another container. The bottom one had some water in it with an aquarium heater, but after reading a bit in the forums today I decided to discard this setup and just leave the jars in a container in the cupboard at room temperature.

Now we wait and see if the whole batch will be ruined by me opening the jars.

I am not sure how to proceed with the fruiting chambers. I got 2 70 liter bins. Initially I wanted to try one as a SGFC and another one as a Poor man's pod with 2 air stones inside and see which performs better, but I see a lot of posts saying that the SGFC will be a lot better. Also, at this point I don't know if there will be enough surviving cakes for 2 chambers. Any opinions on this are more than welcome.



Edited by LyleChipperson (12/05/23 01:36 PM)


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OfflineKinoko314
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Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: LyleChipperson]
    #28486498 - 09/29/23 08:03 AM (3 months, 28 days ago)

Did you use a SAB or was this in open air?  Even if it was open air you may be okay since we're not talking about grain jars.

Did you make sure to get the needle in far enough to pass the dry verm layer?  This is critical.

Take the foil off during colonization.

SGFC has become outdated, and PMP is ancient.  It might still be good if you are going to jam pack it full of cakes, but the preferred method now is a water tub.

Also, use iso for gloves, and lysol for nothing.  Getting all clean is more important when you're doing SAB work.  The spore syringes themselves are usually dirty, so it was probably overkill for doing pf-tek.


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Invisiblewrongbenson
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Registered: 07/20/23
Posts: 61
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: Kinoko314]
    #28486592 - 09/29/23 09:20 AM (3 months, 28 days ago)

Also first time grower here. +1 for the water tub which I think is pretty foolproof and super low maintenance.

I almost finished harvest of 2nd flush on my 1st grow, and my 2nd grow should be ready to harvest in the next week


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InvisibleLyleChipperson

Registered: 09/29/23
Posts: 61
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: Kinoko314]
    #28486619 - 09/29/23 09:47 AM (3 months, 28 days ago)

Quote:

Kinoko314 said:
Did you use a SAB or was this in open air?  Even if it was open air you may be okay since we're not talking about grain jars.

Did you make sure to get the needle in far enough to pass the dry verm layer?  This is critical.

Take the foil off during colonization.

SGFC has become outdated, and PMP is ancient.  It might still be good if you are going to jam pack it full of cakes, but the preferred method now is a water tub.

Also, use iso for gloves, and lysol for nothing.  Getting all clean is more important when you're doing SAB work.  The spore syringes themselves are usually dirty, so it was probably overkill for doing pf-tek.




Thank you for the tips, I took the foil off the jars.

This was in open air. I just looked up SAB and will make a box for the next attempt.

The needle got quite deep, when almost completely inserted it was close to the middle of the jars.

The water tub seems a lot easier to handle, I will set one up. Do you fill it with distilled water, bottled water, water with a bit of H2O2?

Iso is difficult to get in my area. The only available options are 90% and 99.9%. Can I get 99.9% and dilute it with distilled water to 70% concentration?


Edited by LyleChipperson (09/29/23 09:49 AM)


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Invisiblewrongbenson
Beginner
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Registered: 07/20/23
Posts: 61
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: LyleChipperson]
    #28486624 - 09/29/23 09:54 AM (3 months, 28 days ago)

The water tub is filled with tap water and yes it is very simple.

You can get ISO 91/99 to 70%. Just punch it into google and it'll spit out how much distilled water to add


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InvisibleLyleChipperson

Registered: 09/29/23
Posts: 61
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: wrongbenson]
    #28488911 - 10/01/23 01:45 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

So I have the first signs of growth at day 3 and it doesn't seem to be good.

The jar i photographed has another spot on the side that is smaller than this one but looks the same. Another jar has 1 smaller spot that looks the same. All the spots are around inoculation height, but I can't be certain if the needle went there as I had to open the jars for inoculation.

Should I toss them immediately? I went through the sample pictures thread but I couldn't match it with any of the good or bad sample photos.



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Invisiblehellofresh
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Registered: 09/22/23
Posts: 215
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: LyleChipperson]
    #28488918 - 10/01/23 01:53 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

Never done pf cakes before but the black looks no good. I would give it a day just for learning and observe how it grows out but personally I would toss anything growing black mold.

Can you buy agar in your area?


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OfflineKinoko314
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Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: hellofresh] * 2
    #28488931 - 10/01/23 02:12 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

Could it be blobs of spores from inoculation?

I'd wait and observe for now.


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OfflineScrewup
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Registered: 01/27/22
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Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: Kinoko314]
    #28488933 - 10/01/23 02:13 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

Quote:

Kinoko314 said:
Could it be blobs of spores from inoculation?

I'd wait and observe for now.




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InvisibleLyleChipperson

Registered: 09/29/23
Posts: 61
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: Kinoko314]
    #28488942 - 10/01/23 02:22 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

I moved them away from the other jars and will give them more time to see what develops.

The syringe I bought definitely wasn't black with spores, there was one small coagulated visible spore mass inside that I tried to break up by shaking the syringe before inoculation. I did notice that a lot of the visible spores ended up going into 1-2 jars, so blobs of spores would be the best case scenario.

Agar may be available for purchase but so far I can only find malt extract agar in 2 local laboratory supply sites that might only sell to companies, I'll have to spend more time researching my options. The minimal orders are 250g of agar mix and 480 petri dishes and I'm not about to start a whole lab at home.


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OfflineKinoko314
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Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: LyleChipperson]
    #28488991 - 10/01/23 03:18 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

It may be bad news for your jar, but I wish you luck.

250g of agar will last you a while, but it isn't a crazy amount.  It's easier and better to just get light/dark malt extract, and agar (sometimes called agar-agar), and mix them when you make your batch of agar for plates.

You could get some reusable polypropylene dishes instead of buying a case of polystyrene disposables.


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OfflineMrJong
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Registered: 09/30/23
Posts: 216
Last seen: 9 hours, 4 minutes
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: LyleChipperson]
    #28488997 - 10/01/23 03:21 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

Looks like spores to me, does the same kind of "washing off" when it's smothered around. Like others have said just watch what happens, if it's mold you'll know very soon anyway.

Quote:

LyleChipperson said:
Agar may be available for purchase but so far I can only find malt extract agar in 2 local laboratory supply sites that might only sell to companies, I'll have to spend more time researching my options. The minimal orders are 250g of agar mix and 480 petri dishes and I'm not about to start a whole lab at home.




You can make agar mixes with a lot of other stuff than malt extract, for instance you can use BRF, just make sure you first boil and mix it, then filter it through cheesecloth or something otherwise your result won't look clear and will have random pieces and blotches of flour. You can also use grain soak, potato and dextrose, even just washed down coffee would work I believe.

I remember a post around here that listed like 20 different recipes and the quantities for each.


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Invisiblehellofresh
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Registered: 09/22/23
Posts: 215
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: LyleChipperson]
    #28489013 - 10/01/23 03:34 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

One of my first times growing I put spores directly to grains. The mold grew quickly and thick with the same kind of black marbling. Although you should wait and see what happens you already put in the work. I wouldn't stress your other 9 jars are probably fine. Kinoco and screwup are hopefully right and it's just spores.

I'm not sure where you are but you can usually find agar in Asian food markets if you can't buy it online. You only need a few grams.

Have a look at this thread I think you should probably be able to find everything in the store.

https://www.shroomery.org/forums/showflat.php/Number/19208976


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OfflineMrJong
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Registered: 09/30/23
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Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: hellofresh]
    #28489023 - 10/01/23 03:39 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

Quote:

hellofresh said:
I'm not sure where you are but you can usually find agar in Asian food markets if you can't buy it online. You only need a few grams.
https://www.shroomery.org/forums/showflat.php/Number/19208976




Every bio food store has agar around here. And yeah, you only need 1.5g to 2g of agar per 100ml of water.

As for petri dishes you can usually find some in smaller quantities on every other mush spore supplier's website, or on sites specializing in jars and other glassware. Also you can find some on amazon, but I wouldn't trust it that much and haven't tested it myself. If you really can't get any, any small round jar or other similar stuff can also do. Just make sure you pre-sterilize them or use a no-pour tek if you go that way.


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OfflineKinoko314
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Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: MrJong]
    #28489024 - 10/01/23 03:39 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

I would avoid coffee agar, but the others are good.  Starches should be everything mushrooms need, which is why you can use a variety of grains.


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OfflineMrJong
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Registered: 09/30/23
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Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: MrJong]
    #28489040 - 10/01/23 03:51 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

Quote:

MrJong said:
I remember a post around here that listed like 20 different recipes and the quantities for each.




Found it again, worth reposting IMO, lots of random interesting recipes in there.

https://www.shroomery.org/forums/showflat.php/Number/26795122/fpart/all

I'd avoid anything not cereal based though, the species we grow are not interested in stuff like meat.
But it goes to show you can get really creative with the stuff you put in there.


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InvisibleLyleChipperson

Registered: 09/29/23
Posts: 61
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: Kinoko314]
    #28489047 - 10/01/23 04:00 PM (3 months, 25 days ago)

Thank you all for the replies!

Plain agar is easy to find so I will look up the available recipes and see which would be the easiest to put together. Potato starch or dextrose should also be easy to get.

I have to keep everything to a small scale for now as I don't currently have the privacy I like to have, so the DIY approach would fit me better anyway.


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InvisibleLyleChipperson

Registered: 09/29/23
Posts: 61
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: LyleChipperson]
    #28490516 - 10/03/23 12:38 AM (3 months, 24 days ago)

I think it’s looking better and the black stuff seems to be from the spores. Looking from the side it doesn’t go in but rather looks like it’s stuck to the glass. All the other jars are starting to show small spots of growth.



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InvisibleLyleChipperson

Registered: 09/29/23
Posts: 61
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: LyleChipperson]
    #28492833 - 10/05/23 07:37 AM (3 months, 22 days ago)

The jars are progressing slowly, so I'll use the waiting time to learn more about how to handle agar and grain.

I have 20 glass petris and 20 more coming. The potato starch ended up being the hardest to find, but I was able to order online. Agar and dextrose were easy to find. Finding a big enough box for SAB was also a challenge, but I found a wide 100 liter box today that should work out well.

I have about 9 ml of the GT spore syringe left, how many petris can I inoculate with it? The ones I have now are 75 mm/15 mm and I have 80mm dishes coming in.

Coco coir was also difficult to find, but I was able to get a bag of already expanded coir. I'll have to look up how it's used as most information I saw was on coir bricks.


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Invisiblemeta_mmxxii


Registered: 08/03/23
Posts: 598
Loc: PNW
Re: First grow GT PF Tek [Re: LyleChipperson]
    #28493005 - 10/05/23 11:22 AM (3 months, 22 days ago)

Quote:

LyleChipperson said:
The jars are progressing slowly, so I'll use the waiting time to learn more about how to handle agar and grain.

I have 20 glass petris and 20 more coming. The potato starch ended up being the hardest to find, but I was able to order online. Agar and dextrose were easy to find. Finding a big enough box for SAB was also a challenge, but I found a wide 100 liter box today that should work out well.

I have about 9 ml of the GT spore syringe left, how many petris can I inoculate with it? The ones I have now are 75 mm/15 mm and I have 80mm dishes coming in.

Coco coir was also difficult to find, but I was able to get a bag of already expanded coir. I'll have to look up how it's used as most information I saw was on coir bricks.



9ml will do hundreds of plates as you only need a drop or 2 per plate.


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