homegrown spawn?

kingfreddys · 10-20-09, 15:05

which spawn medium is best to grow in a home-scale garden? rye, corn?

zodd · 10-20-09, 15:20

i don’t think there’s a best its just what works for you and you can locally.

ive found wild bird seed to be cheapest and i can get it bulk, 20 kg for £8 so that’s the one for me. you can make flour out of it too which means cheap flour for cakes if you want to go down that rout

I use to be anti pf cake, but ive now come to understand why sandman and others were raving about it. it spawns really fast and is easy to prepare compared to whole grains.

kingfreddys · 10-20-09, 15:52

oh I mean like, grow in your garden. Like growing corn in your garden and then using it to grow mycelium on. What is the best spawn you can grow yourself? ps, i live in the pacific northwest.

zodd · 10-20-09, 16:59

ow right cant help you there bro. but i am interested in hearing the results of you question. Think i may take a perch and listen in.

good luck with it though

Om shanti · 10-20-09, 17:04

I don't think it's so dificult to grow rye.. it's grown even in the highest Himalaya where the soil is quite poor.

But separating the grain from the stalks and all that.. wouldn't that be very time consuming without the proper tools? Assuming it's necessary to do that.. maybe it's not.

Boboso · 10-20-09, 22:18

My best input would be to buy an ear of sweet corn, cut the kernels off, and toss straight into the PC. I don't know much about growing rye, so I can't give accurate advice there...

Growing corn isn't hard, so if the fresh kernels work out in the jars, you'd have something to try... The only problem I see coming from that is how much corn you'd need... I'm estimating a good 2 ears per pint jar. If you have a good corn crop, that shouldn't be a big problem I'm sure, but based on my garden, I had little ears and was lucky to have more than 1 ear per plant.

I'm not a farmer though...

I can see corn being nice though since you could skip past the rehydration stage, but still... To produce spawn for 1 bulk... You'd need to grow like 10-20 plants... If you were planning on maintaining a fresh mushroom supply for yourself year round (considering the growth time of corn) you would need a full field.

Go ahead, grow that field, sell fresh corn from a lil stand, make money, then purchase seed from a feed store or something. I'm sure you'll be better off this way, and have some fresh food for when you're hungry...

zodd · 10-21-09, 04:01

i hear sun flowers are easy to grow

Boboso · 10-21-09, 16:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by zodd

i hear sun flowers are easy to grow

Sun flowers are easy to grow but I'm not sure if I'd personally try. If you dig through the forums, you'll find an experiment where somebody skimmed the trash out of WBS and made a "trash jar" and inoculated it. The trash being floating sunflower seeds. It never grew. If you dig deeper you'll find some people talking about constant contam problems with sunflowers since the myc covers the surface and never actually penetrates to the center of the seed. I haven't really experimented with it, but if all holds true, growing sunflowers for mushroom use may be a waste of time.

If you consider the work/cost of producing your own substrates, you are pretty much better off doing it like the rest of us unless you're a farmer with the land and resources to grow/prepare everything.

I personally will just stick to what works for me. WBS is cheap, and horse poo can be had for free anywhere that has community stables with stalls for rent. Factoring the weight bonus of bulk when compared to cakes, and free shit, the cost of WBS is effectively halved of not reduced by more.

Since it's coming up on Halloween, Prepackaged straw is cheap as hell in any store that carries decorations and home maker stuff... Take Joanne's for example...

hyphaenation · 10-21-09, 16:50

http://forums.mycotopia.net/fungi-gr...xperiment.html (Sunflower Seed/ Trash experiment)

You'd have to grow quite a bit of rye or popcorn to get a big sac that would cost you $40 , but in the other hand if you have the land and equipment to plant and harvest why not.

kingfreddys · 10-22-09, 03:05

based on my climate here in the Pacific Northwest, rye wouldn't be a great choice. My only realistic options would be a crop of winter wheat interspersed with some kind of green manure and nitrogen fixer. That way i'd be using my garden's down time to increase soil fertility as well as get a shroom substrate. I'm still unsure of wheat yields though. and I'd probably have to grow the soft winter wheat variety which I hear is not ideal for shroom growing. So the best option would probably be corn.

zodd · 10-22-09, 03:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by Boboso

Sun flowers are easy to grow but I'm not sure if I'd personally try. If you dig through the forums, you'll find an experiment where somebody skimmed the trash out of WBS and made a "trash jar" and inoculated it. The trash being floating sunflower seeds. It never grew. If you dig deeper you'll find some people talking about constant contam problems with sunflowers since the myc covers the surface and never actually penetrates to the center of the seed. I haven't really experimented with it, but if all holds true, growing sunflowers for mushroom use may be a waste of time.

If you consider the work/cost of producing your own substrates, you are pretty much better off doing it like the rest of us unless you're a farmer with the land and resources to grow/prepare everything.

I personally will just stick to what works for me. WBS is cheap, and horse poo can be had for free anywhere that has community stables with stalls for rent. Factoring the weight bonus of bulk when compared to cakes, and free shit, the cost of WBS is effectively halved of not reduced by more.

Since it's coming up on Halloween, Prepackaged straw is cheap as hell in any store that carries decorations and home maker stuff... Take Joanne's for example...

so should i be discarding the sunflower seeds then?

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10-20-09, 15:05	#1 (permalink)
kingfreddys Mycotopiate Join Date: Dec 2007 Posts: 215	homegrown spawn? which spawn medium is best to grow in a home-scale garden? rye, corn?

10-20-09, 15:20	#2 (permalink)
zodd Maniacal Laughter Mwahaa! Join Date: Jan 2009 Posts: 584	i don’t think there’s a best its just what works for you and you can locally. ive found wild bird seed to be cheapest and i can get it bulk, 20 kg for £8 so that’s the one for me. you can make flour out of it too which means cheap flour for cakes if you want to go down that rout I use to be anti pf cake, but ive now come to understand why sandman and others were raving about it. it spawns really fast and is easy to prepare compared to whole grains. __________________ who would win between a monkey and a dog?

10-20-09, 16:59	#4 (permalink)
zodd Maniacal Laughter Mwahaa! Join Date: Jan 2009 Posts: 584	ow right cant help you there bro. but i am interested in hearing the results of you question. Think i may take a perch and listen in. good luck with it though __________________ who would win between a monkey and a dog?

10-20-09, 17:04	#5 (permalink)
Om shanti S.W.I.M. in H.POO Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 1,297	I don't think it's so dificult to grow rye.. it's grown even in the highest Himalaya where the soil is quite poor. But separating the grain from the stalks and all that.. wouldn't that be very time consuming without the proper tools? Assuming it's necessary to do that.. maybe it's not. __________________ The most important thing is to find out what is the most important thing.-S. Suzuki

10-20-09, 15:52	#3 (permalink)
kingfreddys Mycotopiate Join Date: Dec 2007 Posts: 215	oh I mean like, grow in your garden. Like growing corn in your garden and then using it to grow mycelium on. What is the best spawn you can grow yourself? ps, i live in the pacific northwest.

10-20-09, 22:18	#6 (permalink)
Boboso Boob Join Date: Jun 2009 Posts: 380	My best input would be to buy an ear of sweet corn, cut the kernels off, and toss straight into the PC. I don't know much about growing rye, so I can't give accurate advice there... Growing corn isn't hard, so if the fresh kernels work out in the jars, you'd have something to try... The only problem I see coming from that is how much corn you'd need... I'm estimating a good 2 ears per pint jar. If you have a good corn crop, that shouldn't be a big problem I'm sure, but based on my garden, I had little ears and was lucky to have more than 1 ear per plant. I'm not a farmer though... I can see corn being nice though since you could skip past the rehydration stage, but still... To produce spawn for 1 bulk... You'd need to grow like 10-20 plants... If you were planning on maintaining a fresh mushroom supply for yourself year round (considering the growth time of corn) you would need a full field. Go ahead, grow that field, sell fresh corn from a lil stand, make money, then purchase seed from a feed store or something. I'm sure you'll be better off this way, and have some fresh food for when you're hungry... __________________ Rank me amongst the greats, either 1, 2, or 3. If I ain't number 1, I've failed you victory. - Jay-Z

10-21-09, 04:01	#7 (permalink)
zodd Maniacal Laughter Mwahaa! Join Date: Jan 2009 Posts: 584	i hear sun flowers are easy to grow __________________ who would win between a monkey and a dog?

10-21-09, 16:50	#9 (permalink)
hyphaenation Puck Teknician Join Date: Feb 2007 Posts: 5,646	http://forums.mycotopia.net/fungi-gr...xperiment.html (Sunflower Seed/ Trash experiment) You'd have to grow quite a bit of rye or popcorn to get a big sac that would cost you $40 , but in the other hand if you have the land and equipment to plant and harvest why not. __________________ We're just flying by the seed of our plants.

10-22-09, 03:05	#10 (permalink)
kingfreddys Mycotopiate Join Date: Dec 2007 Posts: 215	based on my climate here in the Pacific Northwest, rye wouldn't be a great choice. My only realistic options would be a crop of winter wheat interspersed with some kind of green manure and nitrogen fixer. That way i'd be using my garden's down time to increase soil fertility as well as get a shroom substrate. I'm still unsure of wheat yields though. and I'd probably have to grow the soft winter wheat variety which I hear is not ideal for shroom growing. So the best option would probably be corn.

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