AFOAF (in Amsterdam) has fair success with tampanensis.So far the best grain for him is annual rye grass seed (not rye grain). He gets it at the local health food store where it is sold for human consumption??. Seed for planting has fungicides on it a lot of the time. He soaks it overnight, then simmers it for twenty minutes, drains excess water and fluffs, loads it into the jars still hot, and sterilizes 45 minutes @ 15psi. He's tried whole grain brown rice and rye grain, neither work as good as rye grass for him. He's trying out an arrowroot flour "pudding" substrate for sclerotia production, doesn't know if it's working yet or not.
He fills the jars about 1/2 full. He innoculates with a mycelium syringe. He generally shakes em up once 5-6 days after innoculation, then puts the jars away in the dark for 6 weeks. A good jar yields 10 grams wet/3grams dry from 1 cup wet grass seed.
Here is a couple pics. The first pic is a "sclerotia jar cap". The inoculation hole is covered with a blob of high temp. silicone sealant. The needle pokes through it easily, it reseals when the needle is pulled out. The floss provides about the right amount of air exchange. Just tighten the cap down and sterilize, the pressure will equalize through the floss. Swab the blob with alcohol right before jabbing the needle though. With this cap it is never necessary to expose the substrate to contaminated air at all.
^^^ Doktor Dung's sclerotia cap, patent pending ^^^
To make mycelium water for innoculation He uses a blender ala 9er tek and uses a sclerotia for mycelium source. He sterilely peels the outside layer off, blends and innoculates. You can get the process started with sporewater inoculation to obtain your first sclerotia. Just a couple drops of spore solution per jar gets it going. Since the jars can be shaken, there is no advantage to a massive innoculation, it's wasteful.
The sclerotia form across the surface of the colonized grass seed and seem to especially like to form at the jar edge against the glass. Tampanensis will fruit directly without forming sclerotia, but the sclerotia can be cased and induced to send up little clusters of shrooms. Only reason to fruit it is for spores, the fruits don't weigh anything much. The production is in sclerotia in this species.
^Sclerotia, approx. life size....... ^Cased sclerotia fruiting
Sclerotia form easily, much easier than getting tampanensis to fruit. The only important warning is to keep them in the dark, no peeking. I actually think that for a newbie, growing sclerotia would be easier than growing cubensis fruits, given a source for a clean spore syringe ( product hint for Workman 
^^^ Doktor Dung's sclerotia cap, patent pending ^^^
To make mycelium water for innoculation He uses a blender ala 9er tek and uses a sclerotia for mycelium source. He sterilely peels the outside layer off, blends and innoculates. You can get the process started with sporewater inoculation to obtain your first sclerotia. Just a couple drops of spore solution per jar gets it going. Since the jars can be shaken, there is no advantage to a massive innoculation, it's wasteful.
The sclerotia form across the surface of the colonized grass seed and seem to especially like to form at the jar edge against the glass. Tampanensis will fruit directly without forming sclerotia, but the sclerotia can be cased and induced to send up little clusters of shrooms. Only reason to fruit it is for spores, the fruits don't weigh anything much. The production is in sclerotia in this species.
^Sclerotia, approx. life size....... ^Cased sclerotia fruiting
Sclerotia form easily, much easier than getting tampanensis to fruit. The only important warning is to keep them in the dark, no peeking. I actually think that for a newbie, growing sclerotia would be easier than growing cubensis fruits, given a source for a clean spore syringe ( product hint for Workman 
^^^ Doktor Dung's sclerotia cap, patent pending ^^^
To make mycelium water for innoculation He uses a blender ala 9er tek and uses a sclerotia for mycelium source. He sterilely peels the outside layer off, blends and innoculates. You can get the process started with sporewater inoculation to obtain your first sclerotia. Just a couple drops of spore solution per jar gets it going. Since the jars can be shaken, there is no advantage to a massive innoculation, it's wasteful.
The sclerotia form across the surface of the colonized grass seed and seem to especially like to form at the jar edge against the glass. Tampanensis will fruit directly without forming sclerotia, but the sclerotia can be cased and induced to send up little clusters of shrooms. Only reason to fruit it is for spores, the fruits don't weigh anything much. The production is in sclerotia in this species.
^Sclerotia, approx. life size....... ^Cased sclerotia fruiting
Sclerotia form easily, much easier than getting tampanensis to fruit. The only important warning is to keep them in the dark, no peeking. I actually think that for a newbie, growing sclerotia would be easier than growing cubensis fruits, given a source for a clean spore syringe ( product hint for Workman ). It takes longer than cubensis, but requires no terrarrium set-up. Since the jars are never opened before harvest, the chances of contamination are greatly reduced. Only drawbacks are the lack of sources for pre-made sterile spore syringes and the cost of spores. Both are understandable though, due to the difficulty in getting it to fruit, and the small prints it makes when it does. Making clean mycelium water innoculant is a moderately difficult job, but can keep the process going for along time without additional spores.
BTW, I would really like to obtain a print (not a culture) of Ps. mexicana and Conocybe cyanopus . I would be really thankful to be pointed towards a good source. Have good trades or $ 
[This message has been disavowed by Doktor Dung on December 12, 1999).]
[This message has been edited by Doktor Dung (edited December 12, 1999).]
Threaded
Previous
Index
Next
Some of these posts are very old and might contain outdated information. You may wish to search for newer posts instead.
CLuB99 
B.I.O. 
Edit 
Reply 
) I don't know if stones would be suitable for someone looking for a level 4-5 or not. 
.jpg)
Skeighest
ohmatic
OJK
Helltick
stevo
