G2G (popcorn) and new fishtank F.C pics. [AUS]

[fingers]

Heya guys,
I've just managed to get my G2G done with the 700ml S.A jar. I'll be really surprised if even 4 of the 6 jars are successful, but it's all good learning.
This image is my 3 shelve unit that I've now moved into a bedroom closet. The top shelf is my fish tank F.C the middle is a temporary make shift incubation area, and the bottom is (was) my blueberry X trainwrecks. (they've now been moved into the grow room).


Even with a good scoop of dry verm in the bottom the popcorn is a lot more moist then i would have liked. One of them even partially flooded. (that's my front runner in the contam race )
And last of all, my side by side. These are the two final 700ml P.R cakes (last of the Po'ricans) The cake on the left was cased with verm/coir. The cake on right was cut into slices nd layered on the bottom of the tub. Then cased with the verm/coir. My thinking is that the increased surface area will increase the yield of the left cake.

(The coffee cup is just excess popcorn/spawn that i cased as is with verm/coir) I didnt want to have to re-open a jar to use the lasts, and didn't want to throw it away, and it's all experience afterall right?).
Annnnnnd... in usual manner, 1-2 questions for the willing and helpful por favor? ...
Should i shake the popcorn immediately? I was thinking of letting it find its own way down, but I'm also wondering if thats going to be slower then a good shake.
Question two, is humidity concerns. I've added two air stones buried beneath the perlite and more water in the perlite then i used in my last F.C. Nothing seems to be bringing the humidity up. I just cant work out what im doing wrong.
The tank is covered (mostly) small amount of FAE. The perlite is thoroughly wet, and the temp sits at around 80f in the day, and 60-70 at night. Beneath the bottom shelf i have a heat blanket which brings the temp up in the closet a bit now tht I've moved the seedlings and dont need to fear cooking them.
I'm actually thinking of throwing a wet block of rockwool in there. I noticed my transparent rubbermaid tht i've used for my seedlings maintained an obsenely high RH. So much so it was a problem at one point (air pump/stones added and increased air exchange).
Anyway, thanks for reading/viewing guys.
P.S Few mixed pics in the bottom. myco and canna (sorry hip i hope u dont mind few thrown up with randomness). They're all grow related in one form or the other...well, maybe not the dog.
Unless he qualifies as a 'source of potential contams'?
I will stop now. Be well all!! and hope u guys had a great thanks Giving.
Fingers

[BigStemz]

you could always just spray you walls a bit to get the humidity up. another problem could b with the 80F temp. thats temps a bit high. so mayb it is drying everything out faster than it can catch up. try to aim for 73F at the lowest and 77F the highest 75F is optimal. I would also recommend that u cut back on how much grain u have in your jars. jars that full will be a biznitch to shake. I learned that the hard way to dude! GOOD LUCK

[BigStemz]

i should of said too that it looks like these casings of yours aren't spawned much at all. my advice would b to seperate the cake from the other two small casings, cover the casings and let them incubate for 5 days or so at around 80F. hope this helps!

[fingers]

Thanks for the suggestions stemz,

But I've had the temps from 60f up to 80f and the humidity is still low. If it was something as simple as a temp adjustment I would have tried that before posting.
Also, the 'casing' is a PF cake. Sliced, layed on the bottom of the tub, and cased as other standard cakes are. The only difference is it's dimensions.
There's no need for any additional incubation time as the cake is 100% colonised.

But again, thanks for the suggestions

[Hippie3]

the first most obvious problem is those tall narrow jars,
those will be nearly impossible to shake well ,
the very narrow bottom will concentrate the moisture on small area,
making it deeper, displacing air tending to favor bacteria.
you must find a better alternative,
to hold that much substrate a much wider container is needed,
even plastic bags or plastic containers .

[BigStemz]

even if the cakes itself that u cased was fully colonized incubation of it speeds of the process dramatically! i usually incubate till about 10% of surface is showing mycelium. Or often i put on a light casing layer wait till it is fully colonized (in incubator) then add more casing layer and put it in the FC, with great relusts, i have some casings that are about to pin that were put in the Fc after myselium was poking threw the surface. I always try to get as close to a overlay as possible, without getting more than a 40% overlay. i just water carefully! And go buy yourself some big ass jars of pickles, i think walmart has them on sail for 2 for 5 bucks, they make grade A big ass spawn jars! w00t

[fingers]

Originally Posted by Hippie3

the first most obvious problem is those tall narrow jars,
those will be nearly impossible to shake well ,
the very narrow bottom will concentrate the moisture on small area,
making it deeper, displacing air tending to favor bacteria.
you must find a better alternative,
to hold that much substrate a much wider container is needed,
even plastic bags or plastic containers .

ahk thanks Hip... I've been storing this jars since i first got them as i remember being told "way to large for cakes, but ideal for spawn".
Damn...

So would you recommend transfering the popcorn into new vessels again at this stage? Or do you mean for future reference?
Oh also, is laying the jars horizontally wise would you think? greater surface area/moisture distribution perhaps?

This S.A myc seems to be insanely resiliant. I remember buckeroo saying that he'll shake a jar once before birthing, so I kind of pushed my limits with the first jar to see what i could get away with.

I shook that thing 3-4 times, and the next 1-2 days the myc vigourously started binding the popcorn again.
Because I've never worked with popcorn before I have no basis of comparison, but damn it seems vigorous and resilant.

I dont know, regardless of the success rate I'm gonna learn something here. I've learnt ten times as much from my mistakes as success'.

Thanks heaps Hip,

Be well all

Fingers

[golly]

I would suggest putting the airstone on a timer to help increase the RH.
If incoming air is very dry ,then even bubbling wet perlite cannot overcome
it....A cheaper solution is to limit the output of the airpump //
You can easily test the theory by turning it off and see the RH climb to 100% with the chamber covered...

[fingers]

ah ok thanks heaps Goll,

I was thinkin the pump might be pushing just too much air through also. I'll remove one stone for a quick starter. See if it helps some.
And tonight when i get home i'll dig up a timer from the grow room.
What would you think as a good starting point? 15 minute incriments. Maybe 15 minutes every 6 hours i thought of trying.
(thinking thats similar to fanning four times a day, dunno if thats gonna work but you gotta start somewhere.

Thanks again G

Fingers

[golly]

That should work ...Still an occasional good fanning [really stirring up the air briefly]
is of great benefit,,especially with casings..
If your automating a system it's helpfull to have a good RH meter so u can tune the system for max air while still maintaining humidity...

[fingers]

Thanks Goll! It worked

i didnt even need the timer, just removing one of the two airstones handled it.


Take care brutha, and thanx heaps for that again G

Fingers :

[llamabox]

So limiting the incoming air was you solution to raising the RH.

Good job. Now we just need to get that Pcorn finished colonizing.

[fingers]

Thanks again for all your help ( across the www) Lama, much appreciated my friend.

The popcorn appears to be doing as well as i could have hoped for. The myc hasn't yet consumed any of the fresh popcorn, but it is binding them.
I'm really pleased so far with the performance of this S.A (thanks again to BIGBOOM ). The time it takes for the jars to almost entirely clench after a shake is amazing to me.
As this is my first use of grain (popcorn qualifies as grain yes?) and only the second strain, have little basis of comparison

I've been unable to use my camera the last couple days, all batteries dead (and i keep forgeting to get more).

Ah well, I'll pick some up in the next day or 2. Thanks for all the help guys, from Buckeroo, to golly, lama, and of course Hip.


Have a good 1 guys

Fingers

[fingers]

Hey guys,

I was gonna wait until there was some visible fruit, but i really wanted to run a problem by you guys and see if any of the more experienced members could suggest a solution.

The temps in the terrarium are often low, and I'm finding the heat blanket to be ineffective with the shelves as they are. Keeping the heat up has been a matter of heating my entire room, which can be a pain in the butt when you dont especially want ur room at 78f.

I then realised the much dispised (by me anyway) heatbomb might work out great in this case. The perfectly flat bottom, perhaps i could keep the vessel (bomb) standing upright constantly.



This aquarium heater is pretty kick ass. It's fully submersible, so I've considered simply laying it down on the bottom surrounded by the perlite. I'd just hate for it dry and blow. I got this heater in a hock shop and have yet to see one anywhere else. It's pretty damn long also, and finding a vessel long enough to make a heat bomb out of has been difficult. I might wrap it up and bring it into a K-mart or another such store, i'd have to find some long jug or something in there.




I've kept the traditional thermometer in the tank, dont think it's nessisary, but it wasnt needed anywhere else, so i figured why not. I'll check that and the digital now. I like a lot of things to be old school i find these days. Scales, guages, or my music (vinyl absolutely... definately sounds better ). anyway..

The healthier of the two last P.R cakes.



I've had problems with overlay in past, i tend to use a lot more coir then i probably should. So while stoned i had this thought, would a fine layer of fairly fine ground verm counter the overlay at all? I added different grades/depths of verm over the coir/verm casing to see the difference if any in fruiting. Then again, not all parts of the cake are colonising the casing, some seems no longer viable. (theyre large, old, tired cakes i think. maybe i should have added some pasturised manure to the equation, even some worm castings. eh, bit late now i guess. I really doubt the verm is gonna make much difference. If overlay was as easy as that to counter it would have been done long ago. ah well, it's interesting and educational to me to experiment and such i guess.(if nobody else )

This is the healthiest of the 6 jars of S.A popcorn/spawn. I dont know what i was thinking by not shaking them all as well as this one. I found by using a circular 'stirring' type movement while shaking it up and down swirled the colonised popcorn almost right to the bottom. I guess i'll know for next time.. (note to self) when u shake, shake it and well.




This is one of the slower unshaken ones, still looking good i guess, just gonna take a little longer. Makes perfect sense, less stirring is less surface/contact area between colonised and uncolonised popcorn. Ah well, as long as a lessons learnt it's not an entirely bad thing.



And this is the reeeeal slow P.R cake. Dont ask me what i was thinking by casing it sliced and layered in that way. :P



Oh, almost forgot. These are the baby blueberry X trainwrecks and noosa gold babies. It's gonna be really hard to give them up, but i have the agent comming through next week, so a full shutdown of the grow room is a must, and i dont particularly like the idea of setting it up again Especially after the anxiety the last grow caused. I think i'll save the growing until the start of my next lease.

I was told they're unstable cos they're only a second generation cross, but lord do they look different. One or two look predominantly indica, while the majority look more sativa. (IMO anyway)



And last pics, a possible glance into their future...



These two images are of a friends grow in the U.S using a batch of the same BB wreck seeds. As i said, its very tempting to keep em



I still have about 30 of these seeds tucked away, and the buddy who bred and sent them is more then happy to send me more. He's about to start on his first cubensis grow. Good guy, really good grower/breeder. Hopefully when he gets started it'll be easy to bring him across to topia.

Anyway, this has been a long one, thanks for reading along as always. Hopefully i'll be able to throw up a some fruit pics in the next week or so

Be well all,

Fingers

[Mind]

[Hippie3]

coming along nicely but that one pcorn jar illustrates my previous point eh.
really, as fast as pcorn naturally is
those jars should be 100% by now,
i've had quarts of pcorn finish in like 7-8 days

[fingers]

I was thinking that too Hip, its taken a lot longer then i anticipated.
I think some of that has to be accredited to the erratic temps in that closet also though. the last few days the whole closet has sit as low as 68f at night. Once the agent comes through this week i can get the old inc set up again.
other then the dimensions of the jars, I'm wondering if the holes stuffed with polyfil might be a bit small?. I'm definately gonna 86 these jars at the end of this run regardless.
I've set up the aquarium heater in the Terrarium, and am using an electric blanket to bring the temp in the jars up a bit. The way the aquarium heater is now, it's done wonders for the humidity, but the heat is definately not spreading through the F.C. Initially when i noticed the light on the heater, and with it set against the glass i thought it was gonna be perfect. But that heat is simply not spreading.
I think I'm gonna have to put together another heatbomb.
Oh also,
I did end up adding a layer of food to the top of that cake. You can definately see the difference in the myc where the coir/verm meets the horsepoo/coir/verm layer i think.Now i just gotta hold my breath for fear of contams. I'm hoping if it hasnt happened by now, it wont.
We'll see how they go with a little more time i guess.
take care guys
Fingers

[fingers]

Nothing much to tell on this one, some excess S.A popcorn that wouldnt fit in the jar, not enough for much. I just fruited it as a preview of the fruit to come from the comming grow.


(yep, its a coffee cup )

I'm lookin forward to seeing some larger fruit, hopefully the monotub or bags bare some chunky boomers.
I'm really looking forward to trying my hand at cloning.

See ya

Fingers

[aumbrellaforainydays]

those look good... so do those plants

[fingers]

Ohhkay,

I've been doing a lot of digging through the archives lately, and figure it's time to grab the bull by the horns and learn some ish.
the popcorns comming along to 100% (finally) and I've decided to do up some cakes as well as a serious 1st attempt at bulk.

I was reading up on additives amoung other things, and figure the best way to gain some understanding on what may or may not work is to become familiar with some of the additives that do.

From what I've read in more then a few posts in the archives, your supercake formula produces some outstanding results, so I'm using that as a blueprint to start off with. This is what I've managed to find.

(Blooms brand) Kelp granules.
http://www.thexton.com.au/product/Bl...__Powder__200g

(Lotus Brand) Shredded coconut.
An australian all organic brand

flax (AKA Linseeds (not many ppl know them as flax here).



And the flax like the rice i buy is biorganic and packed by the health food store i use. Great source of info them people.

Now, do you use flax whole or are there any benefits to be had by grinding (some or all) of them into a flour?

Also, a question on the Bee Pollen.
i dont know if it's similarly priced in the U.S, but here it was near on $30 for a fairly small Jar. Is it really that effective an additive? or is it just a lot more modestly priced in the U.S?

I plan on trying my hand at some agar work, but the store had sold out. I grabbed some pectin for now, but wont start until I have some agar also. (maybe do a side by side for my own learning). I'm thinking of going a PDA for now as I've read pectin contams far more easily then agar and dont want all my eggs in the one basket (especially a contam prone one).

I also got an assortment of vessels. My first shot at cakes was a little bit of a disaster. I'm hoping with the benefit of heinseight from the last batch i can see some better results.
The KFC tubs i think I've mentioned in past. I noticed they use a PP6, and they're also 250 ml (half pint) so i figured i'd give them a shot.
The cute little KFC managerette was happy to help, and took a couple of coins for 10 of them).
I also grabbed some Glad tubs, for cakes and casings. And found these bags that i thought might be handy. Could someone who has some experience with bags (with polyfil ports) give me an opinion on this idea.
Do you think one port of this size might work? Or would a larger wad of polyfil be advisable?


I like the labels on these bags. If nothing else they're great for clean storage. (i luv the slide too).



The slide feels pretty damn sturdy and bites down tight on the polyfil. I'm fairly confident it's a tight enough seal, I'm just unsure if one port like this will offer enough FAE for this amount of sub.
Looking at this image now though, i'd think a larger wad would be wiser.


I'm using my Nylex tubs for myco purposes now that the canna is going on the back burner, so I might bang up a monotub. (didn't see it at the time lamma suggested it )

And the last idea I'm batting around is fruiting bulk sub right through brown paperbags. I realised contams would be a far greater concern with paperbags, so I'll be incubating them in one of the nylex tubs also to offer some added protection.
I've been reading as much as i could find on overlay lately as i found it to be a major problem with my high coir content casing. The pillow case tek always interested me, bags interested me, so a paperbag just seemed like a happy medium.
I'm wondering if higher risk of contams would outweight the reduction (if any) in overlay, i really dont know. (special thanks to Lamma again for all the help/advice)


I love these tubs. 100% opague and very hardwaring.

I still have a few bits and pieces to chase up. I wont start the cakes until I have decent corn meal at least.

Anyway, thanks for sharing the recipe. I would have thought your personal recipe would be closely a guarded secret. It really does get me wondering how many different food sources you would have tried to come to such a specific recipe.

I'm really looking forward to seeing the results.

Much appreciated.

P.S For anyone with an interest in the wager/debate, that casing has not contamed, I've patched it once today and should see some fruit real soon. (damn temps are still 6-10 degrees lower then ideal, and being a bitch to stabilise still). Take care.

[BuckarooBanzai]

First off - greetings! Long time, no see....

Flax - use it whole, in small amounts. Flax powder will turn to a hideous slimey gunk if you use very much at all. Just a dab will do ya.

Bee Pollen - very expensive...but you only need a pinch per cake, really. Works nice in liquid cultures and agar, too. But again, just a tiny pinch (or a knife point, if that is more familiar).

Agar is fun. Pectin is a shitty substitute. Pectin is full of sugars that will throw off your nutrient mix and favor contaminants. Also, pectin forms a really weak gel. If you want a cheap substitute, you can get agar (also called Kanten) from oriental food stores. Be aware, food grade agar can be a bitch to dissolve fully, unless you can get flakes in a plastic/mylar bag. Flakes are reasonably easy to dissolve, but you need HOT water and LOTS of stirring.

Dropping the cash on lab grade agar is well worth it. A little goes a long way, making plates, by the way.

The secret to the polyfill port on a regular bag is to get it tight enough to keep out contams but loose enough to allow air flow. This is almost impossible to achieve without a stiff tube (PVC pipe, for instance) around the polyfill. You just can't grab a wad of polyfill tight enough without choking off the air flow. A little fresh air is crucial to success with bags.

Don't worry about overlay. It isn't really a problem with cubensis. Cubies will fruit quite nicely from a totally white mycelia "overlay." The only problem is later, after the first flush, trying to rehydrate. But that is what dunks are for...

[fingers]

Thank u very much Buck, and it's good to see you alive and well
I couldnt find a store with agar today, I tried a couple of foreign grocers, talked to my chemist, still nothing.
I had a sneaking suspicion the food grade would be inferior in some way, thanks for comfirming that dude.
I'll pick up some of the bee pollen when my Agar comes in. Would you think it'd be wise to go the food grade my first attempt with Agar, surely I'll funk sumthin up, I dunno, I'll see how i go tracking down some lab grade agar before giving up ordering some.
And i've been chasing down some unsalted whole peanuts, that 100% peanut shell sub was insane!!!
If it's that effective/nutritious as a complete sub, it'd be safe to say it'd make a great additive, but eh, I've never used them so dont know.
I'm thinking I'll stick with the S.A for my first cloning attempt. I've heard nothing but good things about S.A.
I did manage to get my corn meal (sold as 'polenta' here(italian term for corn meal if i understand correctly) I'm also planning on fruiting strait popcorn in at least 1-2 casings, so I grabbed 5 kilo's of the stuff.
No go on the bag airports, check.
Overlay not really worth attempting to combat, check.
This port any better? I just worry about having enough FEA.

That said, I'm wondering if there's any point trying the paper bags at all now . I dunno, seemed interesting at the time.
I think your side by side of the coir vs verm pushed me towards a predominantly coir casing material which is what got me thinking about overlay in the first place. An easier fix, Less coir, more verm. check.
One last Question before i wrap up if thats ok. Jars for spawn is what I'm thinking about now. This popcorn has been hella slow, and I really dont want this to happen again with the new popcorn.
(I still dont fully understand how the dimensions slowed the popcorn THIS much).
Last night I was reading that stamets swears by fruiting at or around 84-86F. I was stunned. I've always been of the impression that 86 would be harmful to the myc. Personally after a couple of days of 80f+ temps, i think I'm almost sold.
Oh, and a little bit of a coincidence. I went and collected this today. Cept this isnt pure roo. For whatever reason they moved one of the Emu's into the roo enclosure, so i estimate about %5-10 is Emu.

I'm fairly sure fowl/bird manure of any kind isnt a wise choice, so I might have to sift through and remove Emu from the equation yet.
I spoke with the manager and he assured me the Emu had been fed as the Roo's had for some time now, I'm still a tad hesitant.
Would you say eject the bird turd? Or go with the it as is?
Anyway, too long, too many questions, sorry Buck. It's just been a while since i had a chance to pick your brain.
Thanks for throwing up a response Buck. I'll be a lot more confident going into these next projects now. You've allready saved my cakes with the 'dont grind the flax' point alone!. What a damn waste of sub and additives that woulda been! .
Thanking u very muchly Buck
Sincerely appreciated.
Fingz