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Offlineroominhere
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Registered: 03/01/24
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Last seen: 3 months, 2 days
First time growing! Contamination and stalled issues, help me plz
    #28682267 - 03/01/24 08:00 AM (3 months, 24 days ago)

Hey ya'll - first time posting. Lots of gratitude to everyone on this forum for helping share their knowledge and time :mushroom2::happyheart:

I've grown shrooms twice from a grow kit with good results both times. This is my first time doing it (more) from scratch, and would appreciate any advice on what I can improve in my process. I'm having issues with stalled and contaminated jars. :confused:

Some notes here and pictures below
  • I used mostly this PF tek guide
  • I tried to follow everything closely, referencing videos also. I used wide-mouth 1/2 pint jars, wiped the rim of the jars clean, added 1/2" of verm barrier (from the bottom ring on the jars), steam sterilized for about 100 minutes (water was definitely boiling the whole time), and used a still air box.
  • It's possible my still air box setup wasn't very good, I also may have not heated the syringe up enough, I just used a lighter and didn't wait till it got red hot
  • I used liquid syringes bought online. Two strains, B+ and Menace. I used about 5cc from each syringe, so 10cc total for 12 jars. Two holes per jar. I shook the syringes as much as I could before injection.

I inoculated these on 1/26, so as of this posting it's been 5 weeks. Pictures below are from today. I don't have in progress pics, but 11 days in only 1 jar had myc growth, and 15 days in only 5 had myc growth. Because they were moving so slowly I put them in a room with heat on, but that didn't seem to help. I then also removed the tape from the holes for gas exchange but that also doesn't seem to have helped speed anything up. Probably I should have removed the tape (masking tape, not micro pore tape) at the beginning after injection.

Jar 1 - looks like contamination? (Menace)




Jar 2 - Contaminated (Menace)



Jar 3 - Contaminated (Menace)



Jar 4 - Contaminated (Menace)



Jar 5 - Majorly contaminated, looks like water got into this jar? (B+)




Jar 6 - Majorly contaminated (Menace)



-

Jar 7 - half colonized, stalled



Jar 8 - Almost no colonization



Jar 9 - Almost fully colonized



Jar 10 - Half colonized - this jar has pins forming even though it's not fully colonized?!




Jar 11 - Half colonized



Jar 12 - Pics are missing lol, hard to organize all these pictures.

Help me! Some theories I have about what may have happened:
  • 5 of the 6 contaminated jars are Menace, which was a free bonus syringe. Maybe that syringe was contaminated? The only thing that I'm not sure about is it doesn't seem like the contamination started at the injection site, for most of the jars. And the only B+ jar that was contaminated looks different like water got into it.
  • As mentioned above maybe my SAB or flame sterilizing didn't work properly.
  • I have no idea why they grew so slow and now are stalling out... I'm not sure if they're actually stalled out or just growing really slowly. They should have been about 68-75 degrees the whole time. I tried not to pack the jars too tight, but maybe I did?
  • :confused:


I'm also not sure when to start dunking and fruiting with the varying rates of colonization. Appreciate any advice

Edited by roominhere (03/01/24 09:10 AM)

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Offlineroominhere
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Registered: 03/01/24
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Last seen: 3 months, 2 days
Re: First time growing! Contamination and stalled issues, help me plz [Re: roominhere]
    #28682275 - 03/01/24 08:07 AM (3 months, 24 days ago)

I also spent a while searching for advice on what to do with the contaminated jars. I don't have a pressure cooker. I saw some people say to boil the jars and then dump outside and bleach clean, and some people said to throw them out to be safe. Probably I'll throw these out to be safe since I'm just getting started, but appreciate any other advice on what to do with the contaminated jars.

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OfflineSkropi
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Registered: 11/01/23
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Re: First time growing! Contamination and stalled issues, help me plz [Re: roominhere]
    #28682310 - 03/01/24 08:44 AM (3 months, 24 days ago)

First of all, don't throw away the jars, there's no need. Just wash your jars in the dishwasher and they'll be fine. I am wondering why you have such a high rate of contamination, as PF Tek is very forgiving. What mix ratio did you use? Strictly 2:1:1?
Oh, please remove the vendor name from your post, this is not allowed, as they are selling spores for microscopy, not cultivation.


--------------------
Ἄνδρα μοι ἔννεπε, Μοῦσα, πολύτροπον

Edited by Skropi (03/01/24 08:45 AM)

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Offlineroominhere
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Registered: 03/01/24
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Re: First time growing! Contamination and stalled issues, help me plz [Re: Skropi]
    #28682333 - 03/01/24 09:11 AM (3 months, 24 days ago)

Thanks, post updated. Yes I used strictly 2:1:1 (by volume, not weight).

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OfflineSkropi
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Re: First time growing! Contamination and stalled issues, help me plz [Re: roominhere] * 1
    #28682366 - 03/01/24 09:42 AM (3 months, 24 days ago)

I suspect that not flaming the needle enough to be the culprit, but I am not sure. You said that you followed mostly the PF Tek. What do you mean by mostly? What did you do differently. Honestly I am at a loss, I am not experienced enough, as I would never expect such high contamination rates using brf cakes. I've inoculated 32 jars total till now, and honestly haven't got even one contaminated, so the only thing I can think of is the steam sterilisation, as I use an instant pot that reaches 15 psi, and I sterilise for about 80-90 minutes. If you don't have access to a PC or insta pot, maybe try to double the time you sterilise your jars, and do try to have a very tight fitting lid. I am also waiting for someone more experienced to chime in, as this interests me.


--------------------
Ἄνδρα μοι ἔννεπε, Μοῦσα, πολύτροπον

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Offlineroominhere
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Registered: 03/01/24
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Re: First time growing! Contamination and stalled issues, help me plz [Re: Skropi]
    #28682386 - 03/01/24 10:01 AM (3 months, 24 days ago)

Thanks. I would say my pot lid was tight-fitting, there was only the faintest trace of any steam leaving the pot. And the small amount of water I put in the bottom of the pot didn't dry up after 100 minutes of boiling on low. I did also verify that the water was boiling the whole time.

I just reviewed the PF tek I posted in my OP and I followed it exactly as written as far as I can tell. Hoping others chime in with any other ideas.

Edited by roominhere (03/01/24 10:01 AM)

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Offlineroominhere
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Registered: 03/01/24
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Re: First time growing! Contamination and stalled issues, help me plz [Re: roominhere]
    #28683880 - 03/02/24 12:15 PM (3 months, 23 days ago)

I'm also confused about how I have two separate problems - slow mycelium growth and contamination. I'm wondering if they are related or from two separate issues.

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OfflineHappinessStan
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Re: First time growing! Contamination and stalled issues, help me plz [Re: roominhere]
    #28684031 - 03/02/24 01:50 PM (3 months, 23 days ago)

Mold dies pretty early in the sterilisation process, so mold contams are usually due to poor inoculation, or dirty syringes. Not flaming properly certainly doesn't help.
There's also a high possibility the jars that stalled but aren't green have bacterial contam, some certainly look off, they're clumpy and don't look quite right.
So you didn't put any micropore tape over the inoculation holes after inoculating but, used masking tape to cover them pre sterilisation? That is only gonna increase your chances of contamination, it's not required but certainly adds another layer of protection. Did you cover the lids with foil when you steam sterilised them?
I'd imagine the steam sterilisation process was probably ok, it sounds pretty standard from what i remember of PFtek, provided you foiled the lids.
Hopefully others with more current experience of PFtek can chime in.
Think about it like this, if the jars were properly sterilised then contams can only really get in two ways, either through inoculation (poor technique or dirty syringe) or by wicking down through the dry verm barrier from external moisture.


--------------------





Edited by HappinessStan (03/02/24 01:50 PM)

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Offlineroominhere
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Registered: 03/01/24
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Re: First time growing! Contamination and stalled issues, help me plz [Re: HappinessStan]
    #28684043 - 03/02/24 02:06 PM (3 months, 23 days ago)

Quote:

HappinessStan said:
Mold dies pretty early in the sterilisation process...




Thanks. To clarify on my process - I did cover with foil when steam sterilizing. I put masking tape over them pre-sterilization, and then inoculated through the tape. I left the tape on for the first few weeks of colonization, and then took it off.

Your point about there being only two days for contamination to get in if the jars are sterilized correctly make sense. My guess is I think I did the dry verm barrier correctly, so probably contamination got in through poor technique with the SAB & flaming or a dirty syringe.

I hooope I can get at least one jar out of this, but let's see what happens with the stalled ones. You might be right that they have some kind of contamin that I can't see. How would I know if there is contamin if everything looks right from the outside? Or, if there is myc all around the entire cake, does that mean they are not contaminated? Would also be curious which jars you think look clumpy and not quite right. Appreciate all the thoughts so far

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Offlineroominhere
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Registered: 03/01/24
Posts: 11
Last seen: 3 months, 2 days
Re: First time growing! Contamination and stalled issues, help me plz [Re: roominhere]
    #28686581 - 03/04/24 06:39 PM (3 months, 21 days ago)

Trying one more time to see if anyone has more tips. I'm hoping to do another grow soon and hope to avoid more contamination issues as much as possible.

I get now that contamination happens either in improper sterilization or contamination at the time of inoculation. And the sterilization bit seems straightforward so likely I need to work on my SAB technique, or maybe the syringes were contaminated although I'm not sure how likely that is.

Curious if anyone has any other thoughts. I'm also wondering if the consensus is that the stalled jars (2 jars have now completely stalled with <25% mycelium coverage after >1 month) are definitely because of contamination?

The good news is I have 3 jars that seem full colonized. Currently consolidating and hoping those three work out, going to dunk them in a few days.

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