[fotia]

Hi. Late this year I became interested in mushrooms. I would like to start cultivating but I have no idea how to start. Would anyone here be able to help me get started? Also, I have a shaggy mane mushroom right now, would I be able to do anything with that ( I was so eager to start that I ended up picking it haha ) ... I haven't gone to the library yet.

[peterthinks]

Well here is a great page with all the basics.
http://www.mykoweb.com/articles/cultivation.html
I'm just getting started myself but I'm very close to being able to do everything and almost have everything I need to cultivate.
Some things are hard to find but you can get by with some very basic equipment.
Your shaggy mane is probably liquid goo by now (they don't keep)
but what you need to do is cook up some PDA (Potato Dextrose Agar)
and get some petri dishes ...Glad or ziplock containers will do instead of petri dishes, look for the "PP" in a triangle on the container bottom that means Pollypropolene. short mason jars would work too.
If you're into the Magic mushrooms you can make "Cakes" in the containers too.not my thing but hey you pick up all sorts of info trying to grow gourmet mushrooms.I think Cakes would work for Oyster mushrooms as well.
here is a page on using a roll of TP for a small crop of Oyster mushrooms.
http://www.ncbe.reading.ac.uk/NCBE/MATERIALS/MICROBIOLOGY/oyster.html
get a small propane torch for sterilizing, bunsen burners leave soot on the blade.
An exacto knife with a #11 blade is a good substitute for a scalpel.

Start with Oyster mushrooms (or Enokie),they are really easy to grow.
You can get them fresh at some grocery stores
Wash your hands.
snap it open ,don't cut it cause cutting it drags surface bacteria into the wound, cut out a bit of flesh from the middle with your freshly sterilized blade and drop it onto the agar.
Try to do transfers and sterile work in a still room first thing in the morning before people stir up the dust in the house.
The furnace and air conditioning should be off for a few hours before you work too.I have filters over the vents in my work room.
Or work in your kitchen make 4 or 5 transfers and hope for the best.
a glove box would help if you can't make a room clean enough.
here is your bare bones cheap lab shopping list.

-Exacto knife with a #11 blade
-PDA
-Pollypropolene Ziplock or Glad containers
-Tinfoil
-Isopropol Rubbing Alcohol %90 or a spray bottle of 90% water 10% bleach
or 5% Peroxide solution.
-A pressure cooker
-masking tape or micropourus adhesive tape(for bandages)
-birdseed
-cotton balls or batting

Mix your PDA and melt it together on the stovetop in a big pyrex measuring cup.
pour it into the containers(or petri dishes) 1/4 inch or so deep and let it set
put the lids on loose.
cover the containers with tinfoil to keep the water from dripping off the pressure cooker lid as it cools and sterilize the containers in the pressure cooker at 15 psi for 1 hour.let it cool while closed.
Open the cooker (in about 2 hours)and with sterile hands close the agar container lids tightly then remove the foil cover then tape them shut.
They will keep for months in the fridge or wherever.

Clone some mushroom tissue and let it grow for a week or so until it just covers the surface of the agar,if anything other than the mushroom appears to be growing on the agar you take it outside the work room and get rid of it.Consider yourself contaminated for the rest of the day and don't try cloning or transfering anything until you've had a shower and changed.If you must save the clone cut out a small healthy looking section and transfer it to a new agar dish,keep transfering until the dish grows clean.get rid of messed up cultures outside and at the end of the day not while you're doing sterile work or before you do other sterile work.

soak the seed overnight in warm water to trick all the bacteria into waking up and then sterilize it in the pressure cooker at 15 psi for 2 and 1/2 hours to kill them all.let it cool.

cut the agar into chunks and transfer 2 or 3 to the seed container or break up the agar with a sterile wire and pour in the sterile seed.tape it shut,shake,incubate and wait till it's grown thru (turned white) then fruit it.

Fruiting...sigh that's a whole other post!
Every mushroom is different..some need a cold shock some need light cycles some need dark some need high CO2 some need low CO2 high humidity a specific temperature a casing layer or no casing layer or all the damn planets to line up in a row! Check Paul Stamets book the mushroom cultivator for details on fruiting conditions for specific mushrooms.
It really depends on the mushroom and I haven't fruited anything yet!
I started late last year and switched to forraging(and cloning wild strains) for the summer...now I'm getting the lab going again for the winter.
Wish me luck!

Sorry for the long reply...I tried to keep it short

Peterthinks

[Psynaut]

Great reply peterthinks, maybe you'll be writing a book soon with posts like that

I would recommend 2 books for cultivation that are great and run you through the basics and advanced techniques

- Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms

- The Mushroom Cultivator

Both written by Paul Stamets. You can find more info on his site here: http://www.fungi.com/books/cultivation.html

[peterthinks]

what you can eat,carefull there are poisionous similar looking species for some of these research those before you try to eat them.
http://www.crc.agri.umn.edu/~jamesg/ewm/pt2.html

and how to grow it,specific instructions on what temperature air quality and humidity at what time most edibles need to grow and fruit.
http://www.sacredshrooms.org/forums/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/2103080/an/0/page/0#2103080

Thanks!
I don't think I qualify for book writing just yet...I'm just really good at putting together info from lots of different places.
But I have noticed that most instructions are more like research papers than cookbooks.
people need simple instructions to do things right.
I've read the stamets books,they are geared towards production more than countertop work but the most important info can be found in the above links..
I can't take credit for any of the information,I can only point people in the right direction.

[Psynaut]

Ya, Stamets books can be a bit overwhelming in the beginner. But they are real vaults of information.

fotia - there are also many kits available that make growing easier.
Some good ones can be found here:
http://www.fungi.com
http://www.sporeworks.com/sterilized.html

[peterthinks]

Kits are pretty pricy sometimes,and you have to pay for shipping.
I started by cloning mushrooms from my local grocery store.
Try your local asian grocery to find enokie or shitakie
oyster is the easiest to start with and you can get them fresh at almost any large grocery store
For $10 you can get 3 or 4 different strains to get you started and since you only need a tiny portion to clone the rest can be dinner!
Crimini=Portabelo by the way...they're just picked when they are small.

[Funguy]

[Funguy]

[Funguy]

Just thought I would add my 2 cents worth.Maybe a little late but if you choose to buy those books you can save twenty dollars here. http://www.walmart.com
They had the audabon field guide also 12$.[quote][b]All mushrooms are edible once

[peterthinks]

Wow!! I never thought that wallmart would have so many mushroom books!
I did a search on "mushroom" in the search window at the top of the page and got 6 pages of books!

[Funguy]

Yes and the shipping is free

[cultured1]

I prefer not to shop at walmart although there is a good selection of books about mushrooms.
There are some local bookstores I've been checking for some old ones out of print. Luckily my local mycological society ( www.myctor.org ) has a good library. Cultures to be started in the new year, harvesting hopefully throughout the summer & fall.

Bon apetite

C1