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Doomhammer
EmancipateYourselves fromMental Slavery


Registered: 05/01/00
Posts: 100
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Post Contamination Care Question
#7948422 - 01/28/08 11:18 PM (16 years, 4 days ago) |
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A friend opened up his 'incubation chamber' the other day (a heated tub in a tub in a small empty refrigerator, to find 4 out of 7 treasure coast 1/2 pint jars contaminated. A green mold, it seems like trichoderma. A couple grows had been done in the same area with no problems.
The friend tossed the cakes but kept the jars, washing first then soaking for hours in diluted bleach. Also the entire incubation chamber was cleaned with a bleach cleaner.
Soon after the friend moved up to quart jars and rye berries (now pressure cooked). Things seemed to be going fine but then after about a week or so found one of the jars contaminated with a green mold again. This time the friend just tossed the whole jar this time.
Soon after that the friend went away for the weekend. When he came back he checked his terrarium. Inside there were a number of cakes that had been through some flushes and were nearly spent. There were also a couple of fresh treasure coast cakes that had just started pinning. They were all fine before the friend left for the weekend but when he came back found 3 or 4 of the spent ones with green mold. The fresh ones looked fine. Unsure what to do, he carefully picked up the contaminated cakes and carefully placed in the garbage in another room and took out the trash.
The friend has a HEPA air filter.
Now the friend is worried about future operations. Will the currently healthy cakes contaminate? It's not going to be good to clean the terrarium with the cakes out in the dry air. Not to mention there could be spores in the room no? What about colonizing jars? They will be ready soon. If true that there are spores everywhere, how can he possibly ever return things to normal? The whole operation is in a bedroom and a kitchen. Seems like there could be spores everywhere. Not just the terrarium and the incubation chamber, but clothes, every nook and cranny of the room, tools, kitchen, near the garbage. It doesn't seem feasible to sterilize the whole room. Is my friend blowing things out of proportion? Any tips? Or is he screwed?
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RogerRabbit
Bans for Pleasure



Registered: 03/26/03
Posts: 42,214
Loc: Seattle
Last seen: 11 months, 3 days
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Re: Post Contamination Care Question [Re: Doomhammer]
#7951943 - 01/29/08 06:44 PM (16 years, 3 days ago) |
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Yup. Everytime you let trich sporulate in your growing area, future crops become harder and harder. Clean up the best you can. The biggest impact is on your sterile work, which is going to get harder. Fruiting chambers need a LOT of air exchange, and so-called incubation chambers are dumb. If you have a spot in your house that's 75F, use it. If not, get one. You don't need to 'incubate' unless you're trying to hatch chiken eggs. Incubators are directly responsible for a lot of the contamination people experience. RR
-------------------- Download Let's Grow Mushrooms semper in excretia sumus solim profundum variat "I've never had a failed experiment. I've only discovered 10,000 methods which do not work." Thomas Edison
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Doomhammer
EmancipateYourselves fromMental Slavery


Registered: 05/01/00
Posts: 100
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Re: Post Contamination Care Question [Re: RogerRabbit]
#7952240 - 01/29/08 07:41 PM (16 years, 3 days ago) |
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aww man RR thank for the response but that is horrible news for my friend. Sounds like if there ever was a place for innovation in this field, it's here. Recovering from trich contamination.
Yes the incubation chamber idea seemed like a good idea at the time. The refrigerator has such good insulation it was so easy to control the temperature with a submersible water heater at a very low cost. I can totally see how once contaminated everything would be done, but since its a closed system, seems to me like you could clean it out and recover pretty well. I guess some spores are bound to survive though, and the stagnant air probably isn't good. hmmm ch ch ch changes...
Can anyone give any tips? To make the job more easier and ensure the job gets done completely? For instance does spraying the air with lysol actually do anything? Is there any kind of 'spore killer' spray? Is bleach enough? Is there an easy way to despore your clothes? Like spraying the hell out of the drawers with lysol?
You know, I think there should be more emphasis in the teks on the importance of knowing when to throw out spent cakes. I think there is a tendency, at least for my friend, to want to push the cakes as far as they go. But you can reach the point where you end up screwing yourself badly. I'm sure there is something out there somewhere, but there is so much misinformation too it's hard to dig through and differentiate.
Anyway, that's my rant.
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