I saw a video that recommended instead of a SAB to just use an alcohol lamp at that this would create a sterile workspace around the lamp. Also found this article about the same effect: https://www.neosynbio.com/the-sterile-workspace#:~:text=Using%20a%20Bunsen%20burner%2C%20you,fall%20within%20your%20Sterile%20Workspace.

I somehow can't imagine that to work well. Doesn't that just suck in dirty air from the aide to replace the sterilised hot air that rises?

And if that indeed works with a bunsen burner, will a alcohol lamp be able to perform similarly? It seems a bunsen burner generates a lot more updraft.

I want to put together a little travel-kit to clone mushrooms when on vacation and if this really works then that would make for a great addition to it - but I'm very skeptical

I’m very interested in the idea of consolidating psilocybin and Lions mane in honey as a supplement to add to tea’s, any reason this wouldn’t work? Will the desirable alkaloids in the Lions mane infuse into the honey?

Hello all, I have a question which I'm sure has been tried by at least a few people. After a cake has gone through a number of flushes, let's say 4, has anyone tried to reuse that spent cake again as substrate? By this I mean, repasturizing the cake with boiling water or in an oven, even maybe adding gypsum, and using it with a new batch of grain spawn in a monotub or similar.

Would this be feasible since I've read the coir and vermiculite doesn't hold any nutrients and are mainly a structure for retaining moisture and for the mycellium to grow amongst? Also, would any spent grain have broken down and any potential contaminants killed in the repasturization process?

Im curious to hear any anecdotal evidence or information on this. Thank you

I am planning on starting some outdoor mushroom beds, but I have dogs and they get into shit. I happen to have a bunch of IBC totes however, and I have recently been chopping them in half to make raised beds for growing plants and I had a moment to wonder if this would be viable for mushroom cultivation as well.

I have a great shady spot that also receives a lot of run off rainwater from my roof and can fit at least two if not 4 half totes.

My current plan is to have one tote configured for wood lovers and one configured for manure loving/secondary saprophitic varieties. The main species I am aiming to cultivate are p caerulescens and p weilii in the manure/secondary saprophyte bed and p azurescens and p cyanescens in the wood loving bed.

At least to start that is my tentative plan.

The part I'm having trouble deciding on is how I want to build my "beds". For the woodlovers I have some relatively fresh hardwood logs cut in the last few weeks, I was planning to line the bottom with a few 2-3" rounds and then fill in with some non pine arborist woodchips and potentially a bit of gin trash I picked up from the local cotton gin, it's a mix of raw cotton seed hulls and any other plant matter debris. It's partially composted already and a good source of nitrogen supplementation. I was then planning on sealing the stop cock at the bottom of the IBC tote and filling the whole tote with water and then adding either calcium hydroxide or dolomitic lime and letting it soak for a few weeks before spawning to bulk.

The plan for spawning is to inoculate wheat berries and then spawn those to a small tub of hwfp and/or Aspen chips let that colonize in a monotub and then add that into my IBC bed once it has been drained post lime water soak. Then casing with some coco coir chunk mulch I have.

The plan for the other bed is again log rounds at the bottom ( as they break down they work well as a "water battery" and take space since these tots are about 2' deep after cutting in half) then layering straw and aged horse manure followed by gin trash and finished compost. I am however going back and forth on whether or not I should add some of my native soil, I am in the native range for both weilii and caerulescens and those typically grow on red clay as well. So I'm debating adding some red clay to the mix. I will probably case with coco coir chunk mulch or maybe pine needles since these two varieties in particular tend to grow near sweet gum and loblolly pine. Come to think I may collect a bunch of sweet gum balls and add them in as well or even go so far as to spawn grain to a bin of soaked gumballs and then add them to the tote. I know another user recently did some testing with gumballs as a substrate.

Depending on my results I may retool the other bed for more manure loving species like pans. I'm also not 100% that either the azurescens or cyanescens can handle the hot humid summer I get in the Southeastern US, so that will be interesting to see.

I welcome any advice suggestions or critiques for my plan thus far as well as any tips for the particular cultivars I'm looking at now. I will update as things move along

This jar was hiding in the pantry for at least 7 months. I can't remember that I inoculated it at all.
What substrate would you put it on? It's some culinary mushroom, I know that much. Straw? Wood chips? Wood pellets? Just mix it all and see what happens?
Such a tough cookie should get a chance to fruit.

https://preview.redd.it/y5wai6184swc1.jpg?width=1962&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4898ef82c1d79ce665cf384b86585b0bc7ed07af

I have been a bag cultivator for many years, and I am also a lover of creating Broke Boi Teks (the BBFFU is mine, if youve ever heard of it).

This was a tek a friend and I created and tested extensively called 2B4U Tek (Too Broke For Unicorn bags). We utilized a litany of bags for our experiments: grocery store produce bags (pictured), 2gal Zip-loc bags, Turkey oven bags, and even crock pot liners.

All of them worked, and worked surprisingly well.

For GE (gas exchange) we used a tuft of polyfil at the tops of the bags secured by a zip-tie (as can also be seen in the pic with the bag behind the one being showcased)

Edit: for anyone curious the cultigen in the pic is Makilla Gorilla.

https://preview.redd.it/0gf8kz72cowc1.png?width=1152&format=png&auto=webp&s=06e04878cabf9e66e718aaad0bd61d3b2e3b9854

1 cc of blue king into soaked oats,nothing else. Some trich in there as expected,but will see how it grows in a pot. Will be putting the rest outside in the garden. I use oats as a green manure on our small farm,so might be worth doing on a bigger scale

https://preview.redd.it/b3grdj8l4yvc1.jpg?width=2448&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=49356709f8b2c03c62b1854006d4db92f60a2805