Low tech no fuss substrate making attempt

[Neron]

Hi everyone,

Just wanted to share with you my first attempt in making substrate at home. Basically I'll try to produce some usable kinshi bottles and tubs and also attempt to rot wood logs and to ferment some sawdust into improvised flake soil. When I say low tech no fuss attempt I mean simplifying the existing process a bit.

First the kinshi attempt.

I'm by no means mushroom growing expert but I do have some experience and knowledge in growing edible mushrooms. We all know that the biggest problem in any mycelium cultivation is keeping contaminants away from your substrate, however I had no time/ desire/ equipment to do it the correct way. By that I mean I did no sterilisation, no pasteurisation, no disinfecting of containers, bags or workplace and I didn't even made an attempt to work clean. Why? Well in my previous attempts I always had part of the batch contaminated no matter how much effort I put into preparing my working environment and disinfecting materials. So now I decided not to even try to get a clean batch. Instead, I'll leave nature to itself and just try to create conditions that favour my chosen mycelium ahead of the mildew and other unwanted fungi. I'm hoping to achieve at most 50% contamination on my substrate. The good part of the kinshi tubs/bottles will be used for beetle breeding and the contaminated ones will come to use later on for the other parts of the project (more info further down). What I actually did was to get all materials and tools in my kitchen, mix the raw ingredients without any preliminary preparation and stuff the ready mixture into plastic tubs and bottles. I used 5kg of hardwood sawdust, 1kg of of wheat bran, 1kg of blue grey oyster spawn and around 5.5l of water. I took a 65l plastic box, dumped the bran and the sawdust and mixed them and then added the water gradually until I felt wet enough. The mushroom spawn was then added and the thing mixed again. The sawdust is mainly oak, beech, some mahogany and trace amount of other hardwoods. There is no way to tell what exactly is in my sawdust batch and in what proportions, however it's a commonly bought and used for production of edible mushrooms. I got the spawn from the same dealer, just grain ready to be used for inoculation. The water was a bit of a problem since I did not have enough of it distilled and I had to top up with chlorinated tap water (approximately 50/50 tap to bottled). After everything was mixed and bottled/boxed it looked like that: photo1

The mix was prepared on 13/10 and kept in my unheated garage where temperatures ranges between 8-9C to 18-21C (approximate). This is how it looked on 16/10: photo 2,3 and 4

From this amount of raw materials I managed to fill 10 2l tubs, 3 2l bottles and 2 yogurt tubs just over 1l each. Also I didn't bother drilling wholes for air exchange on any of the tubs but did 3 small holes on the bottles lids. Some of the tubs were closed tightly (by accident) and some were just left with lids on top but not properly closed. The tightly closed ones have no visible signs of spreading mycelium yet, the bottles however seems to be doing well for now (except one that seems to have a bit more water than needed at the bottom, see photos).

That's is for the first part: get, mix, stuff and leave in garage. Will post updates of it going forward.

Secondly, attempt to rot wood logs outdoor.

Just over a month ago I trimmed my overgrown fig tree and I saved some of the thick branches and part of the main trunk. Its various sizes in length and diameter, I also stripped the bark from some of them and piled them into a small raised bed. See photos (only half of the wood I ended up piling there is on that pic) photos 5,6 and 7. My initial idea was to bury it with a mix of compost, dry leaves and the part of the contaminated kinshi, then use the bed for my plants for couple of years or so) and then dig out the wood and hopefully use it for my beetles. However, I changed my mind and decided to move all logs (and later on) the contaminated part of the kinshi into big plastic box, water it a bit if needed and seal the box in order to prevent other creatures munching on my wood. I would then leave it in my garage for a year or more. Obviously it will require checking on and off but my expectations are to be ready in couple of years. Additionally, as you can see on the pictures I have left two (to be) logs still on the tree stump. I have ordered mushroom dowels which I'll use to inoculate the wood as soon as I cut it. After that the inoculated pieces will be placed in bags and left outside in my garden. When the logs are ready to fruit I'll eat all mushrooms and use the leftover white rotten wood for the beetles. Again we are looking at 18-20 months or more before the logs are ready. My only worry with this part is the fact that I'm not sure if the box idea will work, but if i leave the woods/kinshi mix outside it will get attacked and eaten from other insects long before is ready for the beetles. We'll see after some time I guess. I'll also have some dowels left which I'll stick into some of the thicker wood branches and trunk parts that will go in the box.

Lastly, flake soil preparation attempt:

I have still 5kg of sawdust left and I will cook some flake soil with that. There are plenty of ways to do it online but again I'll be looking at something simple. I could use a plastic box to ferment it indoors (garage), or breathable bags and leave it outside (to avoid all smells) or even buying a plastic green waste composter (the barrel looking ones that you can rotate by hand to mix the contents). It's probably gonna be the bags outside, but haven't decided yet. Plus if any of the kinshi containers fail to grow (or gets contaminated) I was gonna chuck that in and ferment it any way (just to see what is gonna happen). I have other ideas for flake soil preparation but that a different topic, now I'm trying to use/reuse whatever left from unsuccessful kinshi.

It will take some time to get any results (negative or positive) out of my little experiment that is why I'm asking for some ideas or feedback. If anyone have a way of improving, simplifying of speeding up the work please let me know, I'm all ears.

I'll post updates soon.

 

[Titanus]

Best of luck! It seems that producing flake soil and kinshi is really catching on here. Makes one wonder what kind of potential small business opportunity there might be?

It sure would be nice to be able to buy high quality flake soil and kinshi bottles/blocks from an American supplier. Not to mention being able to both support the American beetle hobby while avoiding the exorbitant costs of importing materials from Asia!

 

[Shade of Eclipse]

You need to monitor the moisture level of the substrate better before you inoculate with spawn. If it's too wet, mycelium has a difficult time growing while bacteria and yeast have an easier time spreading. The substrate should not be so wet that any water gathers towards the bottom or drips off of it. If it's just a little too wet, you'll also have the issue of the substrate turning into a disgusting mush as your larvae feed on it before it's fruited and used up the excess moisture. If you're using grain spawn, you probably do not need to add more nutrients to the sawdust and could just consider the grain of the spawn as the supplements. This way you'll reduce the available nutrients in the substrate and further limit the chance of contaminants taking hold. You'll just go through more spawn than normal and it might not fruit as many times or produce as abundant and large of mushrooms, but the wood will still be decayed enough for use.

Some fruit trees have extremely dense wood that mycelium has a difficult time colonizing, so it usually takes a bit longer with those woods. Figs are pretty fast growing and have less dense wood, so it should work as long as you've set the wood aside long enough for it to die and stop producing protective latex that will stop mycelium from colonizing it. Another method of inoculating wood that's easier and faster is to apply mushroom spawn to both cut ends and then wrapping the whole thing up in plastic and setting it aside. The mycelium from the spawn can easily grow into the cut ends and you save a lot of time inoculating. Of course, it'll take a long time for the mycelium to fully colonize the piece of wood this way if you have very long pieces of wood, so it's recommended that you cut them shorter and them stack them up with spawn sandwiched between each piece. By using plugs, you get an even distribution of inoculant and the whole piece of wood is inoculated more evenly, but the mycelium ends up having to travel across the grain which takes a little longer than traveling with the grain of wood.

 

[Neron]

Thank for the heads up. I had a quick look at some off the containers today, and it seems that 2 of the bottles have an exccesive moisture content. At the very bottom of the bottles I can see the sawdust been darker. Mycelium seems to be growing fine for now but I did turn all bottles upside down in an attempt to drip out the extra water. Hopefully will be ok. I was thinking if the bottom part doesn't turn out well can I cut it off and use the top part of the bottles?

Also I'm happy to hear that the grain itself can be considered as additive, it makes perfect sense about the contamination level too. Great info thanks.

P.S. the 2l tubs seems to fine with the moisture for some reason, may be the taller bottles are making a difference (the water normally gathers in the bottom third of any container filled with moist substrate).

 

[Shade of Eclipse]

The excessive moisture limits gas exchange and causes the substrate to become anaerobic. In a taller container, there's even less surface area, so gas exchange is pretty much nonexistent. In a flatter container with more surface area, there might be enough gas exchange for the mycelium to grow even if it's a bit wet. Mycelium actually grows well in higher carbon dioxide levels and produces lots of carbon dioxide as a way to outcompete other organisms when growing, but it still does need to have oxygen in order to undergo respiration.