Mushroom Farming

What is a Mushroom?

A mushroom is the fruiting body of a fungus. While it may look a lot different than a tomato or a melon, it serves the same purpose: to produce new offspring.

It’s important to note that not all fungi are mushrooms. The mold on your bread and the mildew in your basement are also fungi, but they’re not mushrooms.

The Mushroom Life Cycle

It’s important to remember that mushrooms are just one life stage of the fungus. If your aim is to produce a large mushroom crop, it’s helpful to understand all the stages of the mushroom life cycle.

Remember, mushrooms are the fruiting bodies of the fungus. As the fruiting bodies, mushrooms release spores. You can think of these spores as you think of seeds in plants – they’re both tiny reproductive structures.

Once the spores land in a favorable environment, they start to germinate. After germinating, the spores send small strands called hyphae into the ground.

A bunch of hyphae together is known as mycelium. As time passes, the mycelium grows through wood or soil and expands the area it covers. Even if you only see one mushroom, it’s mycelium might cover hundreds of square feet!

Once the mycelium has expanded, parts of the mycelium condense to form small mushrooms called primordia. Only a few of these primordia turn into full-sized mushrooms. After these surviving mushrooms mature, the process starts all over.

Mushroom Farming at Home

Now that you know the basics about mushrooms, you can learn about some of the ways you can start mushroom farming at home. While these methods vary in difficulty, they all start with mushroom spawn.

What’s spawn? It’s any substrate, such as straw or sawdust, that contains mycelium.

Use a Kit

These kits are the easiest way to get started with mushroom farming. They consist of a plastic bag filled with spawn.

Once you receive your kit, all you need to do is poke some holes in the bag and provide the right conditions. Usually, this is a dark and damp place. Once the conditions are right, the mycelium will start growing, and in a few weeks, you’ll be able to harvest some mushrooms!

Some kits to try out are the pink oyster kit from Forest Origins and the lion’s mane kit from Michigan Mushroom Company.

Make Your Own Grow Bags

Another option to grow your own mushrooms is to make your own grow bags. This is a great option if you want to scale up your mushroom production since it decreases costs.

For this method, you’ll need some spawn, plastic bags, and a pasteurized substrate such as straw. Mix the spawn with the substrate, place into plastic bags, and treat the bags as you would treat pre-made mushroom kits.

The tricky part about making your own grow bags is pasteurizing the substrate. In order to prevent competition from other fungi and bacteria, you’ll need to kill off any unwanted organisms. To do this, you’ll need to heat your substrate high enough that it kills the bad guys, but not high enough that it kills all life.

One way you can do this is by cooking your substrate in 160ºF water for one hour. You can do this in pots on your stove, but of course, this space is limited.

If you’re interested in scaling up and starting a mushroom farm, you can sterilize substrate outdoors using a metal drum over a fire or a gas burner.

Plug Some Logs

You can also grow mushrooms on logs. For this method, you’ll need a log, a drill, spawn, and wax.

Before you start, make sure the species of mushroom you want to grow is compatible with your logs. Many mushrooms form symbiotic relationships with tree species, and they won’t produce mushrooms when paired with incompatible trees.

Look for logs that are 4-6” in diameter and that have been cut in the past two months. Using a 5/16” drill bit, drill 1” deep holes about 3-4” apart. After the holes are drilled, it’s time to fill them with the spawn.

You can either purchase premade spawn plugs or plug the holes using loose spawn. If you’re using spawn plugs, simply place the plugs in the holes. If you’re using loose spawn, you’ll need to use a special tool called an inoculator.

No matter how you plug your holes, you’ll need to cap them with wax. Heat up cheese wax or beeswax, and apply a light layer to the outside of each hole.

At this point, stack your logs in a shady spot and water the logs every week. Alternatively, you can soak your logs in a tub or lake for 12-24 hours every few weeks. Don’t let the logs dry out since this can kill the mycelium.

Now here comes the hard part: waiting! After inoculating your logs, you’ll have to wait 1-3 years before you have any mushrooms to harvest. However, once the logs start fruiting, they’ll continue producing mushrooms for 3-5 years.

Types of Mushrooms that are Easy to Grow

While you can produce hundreds of different types of mushrooms, some are easier than others, here few of the best.

Oyster

There are many different types of oyster mushrooms including red, blue, pearl, and golden. The blue oyster is one of the easiest mushrooms to grow, so it’s a great choice for beginners.

Shiitake

Shiitake mushrooms have a meaty texture and earthy flavor.

Lion’s Mane

These mushrooms look like shaggy cotton balls. They have a delicious flavor that is reminiscent of lobster.

Go Farm some Mushrooms

Now that you know the basics of mushroom farming, pick a method and try growing your own mushrooms at home.