Casing Colonization Question ???

[stevenmhubel2007]

Why is it that my ... 50% Vermic. 25% Coir. And 25% Peat With Lime Casing WILL NOT COLONISE AT ALL ! I put the casing on after breaking up my BRF cakes into small pieces. Then Waited a day to Heal itself in Incubation Chamber, then Put a 1/4 '' of casing on top. Put Back into the Incubation chamber at 80 deg. And its the second time trying this and the same thing has happened. They say to Put into fruiting conditions/ Fruiting Chamber When casing becomes 30 to 50 % Colonised but my casing doesnt ever get colonise 10% even ??? I am thinking to add a small amount of Horse manurer into the casing mixture to help it clolonise but will that do any good ? I have put it into a coffe grinder andf powdered it and also added a bit of worm castings to the casing mixture. I have scraped the old casing after being a week to ten days of nothing and seems to be all fine inside and white with micllium, so I mixed it up again. Now I need help on to either add the new casing mixture onto the crumbled cake or what? I never get good flushes not casing so this is why I wemt to casings in the first place. I would like to do a straw / Manure mixture next but would like to learn the casing first seince it is an important part of growing. I am really interested in the challenge of growing mushrooms , and all the different stages to this but have become frust. with this casing thing . It seems that casing gets a better flush and healthier Micillium so I want to lean how to do this RIGHT ! Thanks

[chimp]

The reason to have a casing in the first place is to create a micro-environment on top of your colonized substrate to stimulate optimal growing conditions for the mushrooms. I don't suggest using manure, straw or castings for your casing material. Casings are supposed to be mostly non-nutritous in composition. I wouldn't even use peat on mine but to each their own I guess. You may want to re think the "powdering" of the casing in the coffee bean grinder. WHat is the mousture content of your casing? It should be at field capapcity. The casing layer needs to be light and airy and not "packed" down.

[chimp]

Also, how did the sub look before your applied the casing layer?

Do you have good quality pics of before and after you cased it?

That would help immensely.

[stevenmhubel2007]

when I took off the old casing it was white and nice looking so now what do i do so I dont screw it up again? I didnt powder ALL of the casing , I have a huge bag of Peat , Coir , And Vermiculite. So I can make a fresh batch with those ingredients

[stevenmhubel2007]

50% Vermic... 25% Peat And 25% Coir and also I have the ingredients seperate so i can add some to make a certain mix. I can make a new but wich mixture do youn prefer ... reccomend for this ?

[stevenmhubel2007]

Or I can work with the bag of mixture ive made with the 50 25 25

[chimp]

It would be helpful to see if you have overlay(see overlay) on the surface of your substrate..that could be a problem. 50/50 coir/verm is a good mix try that..leave out the peat. Make sure that the mixture is hydrated to field capacity(see field capacity). then apply it to the top of your substrate and cover with foil...poke a few holes in it and put it back in the incubator for a few days or put it directly into you FC. Up to you.

[chimp]

If you don't know the definition of overlay and or field capacity look it up in the vaults or glossary

[stevenmhubel2007]

That makes sense ... I will do that and there was no overlay at all. I left a TINY bit of the old casing on it and just a small amount of white was showing and it looked healthy. Now it should grow through the casing right or when I switch it to fruit ... will it start to poke through. I guess this is were I get all screwed up . I am believeing that YOU NEED to see the mic. Poke through to be able to fruit. I see everyone elses casing and were the white is poking through ... thats were it fruits almost always from what I see, is this correct or when you put it in the fruiting chamber ... will it fruit even though the casing layer isnt penetrated by micll.? thihs is were I end up scraping it off and screwing shit up cause im thinking that it needs to get through to have fruits ............ ?

[chimp]

The myc will poke through don't worry. Sounds to me like some patience is needed

You can hurry things along a little by doing what I suggested(case, cover and put back into the incubator for a day or 3..make sure you poke some small slits into the foil used for covering it) that should speed the colonization of the casing up a bit.

Patience is a virtue

[stevenmhubel2007]

I Appreciate it

[chimp]

I aim to please