Wasn't quite sure where to post this. I was reading the other day that Shiitake / Oyster and similar mushrooms can be grown in oak and other logs from spore plugs. Would anyone have any idea or have any useful info about where they grow best and any tips please. On one website they had a photo of them growing on old used coffee grounds. Wondering the best medium for growing in the UK. Many thanks.
You can also buy kits, like this: http://www.gmushrooms.com/pots/Oyster.htm I did it once and it worked.
They like to grow on non-aromatic hardwoods. Like oak, poplar, etc. http://www.fungi.com/ If you order their free catalog you will see photos of how people set up their logs. I'm going to be doing this project in spring 2009, but I'm going to be making my own plugs. Take log cuttings in early spring or fall, with bark intact. Width 4 to 6 inches, and length as long as you are capable of handling and soaking. I'd say 3 to 4 feet long. Drill holes a few inches apart all over the log. Hammer in a pre-inoculated wood dowel plug with a rubber mallet, seal with cheese wax or beeswax. Keep in shady area. When log fully colonized soak for 24 hours in water, then set out to let fruit. Logs can either be stacked up Lincoln log style, or standing up against a structure on a shady side. You can inoculate in either spring or fall. But they will fruit in the fall after a summer of colonization of the material. You can have successive fruitings and constant harvest if you rotate the soaking. Each log should produce for a few years. You can also inoculate used coffee grounds and shredded newspaper in a bucket with used Oyster mycelium from a kit and have more fruitings. You can keep it going as long as it has food. I saw a picture where someone fruited Pink Oyster mushrooms on a "log" made of shredded newspaper. You can use pasteurized straw, wood chips, and even wood stove pellets. Just pour boiling water over the wood stove pellets to get them to loosen up to sawdust. I've seen pictures of straw stacked up in laundry baskets full of Oyster fruitings. Straw can also be packed into clear plastic tube bags and hung up. Poke a few holes in the plastic when it's colonized and it will fruit out the holes. You can also use spent spawn sandwiched between short cut sections of logs and stack them up like a totem pole. But keep it watered so it doesn't go dry. Don't forget you can get outdoor kits too, where you pile up compost/straw/wood chips, etc. Shaggy Manes and other types can be grown in the lawn or even inside a greenhouse under plants or out in the garden under plants. Someone out there grew the Wine Caps underneath Hostas. The guy who owns the site listed above has worked with scientists in really neat studies. His name is Paul Stamets. They did a study with petroleum soaked dirt. There was a control pile, a pile treated with chemicals, a pile treated with bacteria and a pile treated with Oyster spawn. The Oyster pile fruited LARGE happy mushrooms, ate the petroleum, rotted down which attracted insects, bird droppings, and pretty soon weeds started to grow in the pile. In all the other piles, it was a nasty smelly mess with absolutely no life. The mushrooms reclaimed that dirt from the pollution. Just imagine what else they can do. I read another report where they used Shitake mushrooms to eliminate E-coli from going into a body of water from runoff from a cow farm. Water tests confirmed a dramatic decrease in the amount of E-coli in the water after the mushroom treatment.
Here is the article of what you can do with spent mushroom kits. http://www.fungi.com/kits/mileage.html
Thought I would add this from oe of our local shows. http://www.abc.net.au/gardening/stories/s2594661.htm http://www.mtg.unimelb.edu.au/Shiitake.htm Liz
I've been able to grow shiitakes (on a log) and oyster mushrooms (on a roll of toilet paper) indoors, and so far it's gone quite well. I've posted a guide here that might be helpful and could probably also be adapted for use outside. It also has links to places that sell different kits and spores and things.
