Giving Trich The Cold Shoulder

[hyphaenation]

Recently I resurrected am old jar of Phoneix Oyster. I placed it in well pasteurized straw and let colonize. Everything went well until I noticed that two of the logs had spots of trich.

I decided to throw them in a cold cupboard in the kitchen on the north side of the house. A week went by and then another so I decided that I better go chuck them before they fully contam the house. To my surprise the one log with 2 or 3 trich spots was completely white and colonized and it "appeared" that the Oyster mycelium had eaten the trich.

The other log that had larger trich infestations was also fighting back and most of the trich spots had turned dark and half were recolonized white by the Oyster.

I'm quite sure that had I left them colonizing in the warmth the trich would have gone out of control. I've grown enough failed batches of straw to have seen this phenomenon several times before. Whats different this time is having put the freshely contamed logs into cold storage.

Whats interesting to me is that the Oyster mycelium actually grows at a fairly decent rate at 50 F where as the trich seems to die basically and allow itself to be overcome by the Oyster , something that can't take place at warmer temps.

I know this isn't breaking news as its been reported in books on the subject but I did want to remind people that it is possible. More experiments are necessary.

[marmy]

that is awesome information. thanks for sharing

[zodd]

compared to cubes oysters are freakin relentless. had a case of bacteria on some phoenix oysters that i had on agar. luckily i was able to out run it with some transfers, but amazingly the plates that i had taken the transfers from, a week later had phoenix oyster mycelium crawling up the walls. and the bacteria hadn’t moved an inch.

[P4ulada]

Man, it´s a great thing to try!
I´m trying some king oyster for the first time (thanx zodd ) and I´m a newbie with straw - hay...if some trich appears I´ll put it on a cold place! Or maybe in the fridge ^^

Thanx for share that though =]

[zodd]

Kings will grow on straw but they will grow better on coco coir or card or preferably card and coco coir together.

glad to hear you got those kings going.

Look forward to hearing more bro

[ggod]

Oyster mycelium is extremely vigorous and this is testament to that fact. Although it is not "new news", I am sure this will help keep it fresh in our minds, that to know the enemy can be our best defense as well as offense.

Now if only a way can be found to limit the propagation of trichaderma in a warmer environment. Personally, that knowledge would be the "Holy Grail" of cultivation.

It would be interesting to take a tissue sample from a fruit that develops in the area that overcame the trichaderma, and isolate the most resilient mycelium. Although I don't know how you could go about "stressing" the mycelium to where "normal" mycelium would fail. If you could figure a way to do this, it would seem to me that you would not necessarily have a trichoderma resistant isolate, but a "super-modified" set of genetics. And those genetics (in theory) might be able to be isolated further.

The philosophy that I am using is based upon my understanding of genetic characteristics and what makes certain genetic characteristics surface.

With that in mind I am lead to believe that mycelium that has encountered trichaderma and has survived triumphantly, would have that vigor earlier, in future cohabitation with trichaderma.

I think it would be an interesting theory to test. Although I also think the controls might be hard to regulate, as far as an actual comparison study. It could only be determined (in my mind) through observation and a detailed understanding of unwelcome contaminant.

I didn't mean to go off and ramble about my theories, but you did say more experiments are necessary. I just thought I would offer some ideas to you, about what might be worthy of studying.

Best of luck and let us know what happens with this grow.

ggod