Cubensis Grow: Cambodian Mushrooms

Sorry I'm starting my journal a little late, but not too late to miss the fun stuff.

Anyways: I did the PF tek. 8 x 250ml organic brown rice flour/vermiculite/water jars. I don't have a pressure cooker nor did I want to buy one so I steam sterilized for 1.5 hours and left overnight to cool.

Next morning I inoculated them in my oven after pre-heating it for sterility. I now have my grow room set up:

Blue bin: Has prob 4-5 inches of H2O + H2O2, with an aquarium heater set at 86F. They have been in there for 3 days now, some with obvious beginnings of colonization, will post pictures of jars soon (did a lot of moving when making the grow room so I don't want to disturb them anymore today). They are elevated in the water so that the bottom of the jars are just touching water.

Clear bin: Fruiting chamber, will contain a thick wet layer of perlite, light is a 42w CFL on a 12/12 timer (not using yet obviously).

I will be doing something very similar to this in the near future. Im curious if there will be any infections because of the sterilization method(not having a pressure cooker). Hope it works out well for you.

Not having/using a pressure cooker is fine. I use a basic pot with a vegetable steamer basket on the bottom to sterilize my jars and I have a 99% success rate. Just make sure the area you are using is clean! Get some anti-bacterial wipes and wipe EVERYTHING down and spray the air with Oust, Lysol isnt as effective. Put your jars in the oven for 20-30 mins at about 200 degress before loading them up. Wear a face mask, some gloves are a good idea and if not just keep some hand sanitizer close by.

Your set-up looks and sounds pretty good. Ive never heard of anyone keeping their jars in water during colonization, so let us know how it works out for you.

www.shroomery.org is a good place for more info.

Also, for future grows, try using a liquid culture. I get full colonization of my jars in a week and its pretty damn simple.

Good luck!

AKRevo41, can you emphasize on the liquid culture technique? I read it on shroomery and got a little lost, is it just a sugar water? Im very interested in this if its simple...

Fo sho!

I used this tek: http://www.shroomery.org/forums/showflat.php/Number/10446142#10446142 and it has worked every time.

Dude drop the little shit and go bulk. Do grain to grain transfers and get fully collinized quart jars in 4 days. Personally I'd rather be pulling oz's from trays instead of 1/8th's off of cakes. But you can only do this if you buy a pressure cooker.

If you have a big pot and let it sit for a soft boil for a hour and a half you'll be fine. You don't need a pressure cooker until you use other various substates like rye berry!

I like bird seed

Grizzdude said:

I like bird seed

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Yes bird seed and manure work like marvels! Healthy, fatty mushrooms full of psilocin

thanks guys. i totally agree grizzdude. my plan is to go bulk after this grow, this is just to get my feet wet, im a chemist not a mycologist

anyways, i was actually not too happy with the colonization speed thus far (especially since I got Cambodians just for their speed), but last night i shook the jars and aggitated them and they must have enjoyed it because they look much better today.

DAY 6
sorry about the shitty photo i have to use my iphone

i got 4 jars colonizing right now about to go get aquarium heater for incubator so i can start some more. good luck

ya good luck to u too man, the aquarium heater is a must. i had a heating pad under it and the temp was either too high or too low, and the damn thing had a safety so it would shut off every 2 hours. The aquarium heater is awesome, my incubator sits at 86 degrees all day with no maintenance.

witch brand aquarium heater did you purchase i had already bought a little one from walmart but it burned out and had no temp control on it so kinda a waste

I wouldn't recommend an aquarioum heater. If temps are around 75-78 that is optimal for colonization. the higher temps could get your myc to grow a little faster but it GREATLY improves the chance of getting contamination as the bad contams love temps of 80 degrees and up. Don't worry about cooler temps, during the winter I was growing cubes in the upper 50's with great success.

ErikHags said:

ya good luck to u too man, the aquarium heater is a must. i had a heating pad under it and the temp was either too high or too low, and the damn thing had a safety so it would shut off every 2 hours. The aquarium heater is awesome, my incubator sits at 86 degrees all day with no maintenance.

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Incubators are not a must if you live in an environment that is around 75-80 degrees in temps. Sometimes incubators can stall growth because people wrap them in blankets brining no CO2 exchange into the jars. Faster colonization is not always the best thing, but patience sure is

well shit listen to the veterans...
but my aquarium heater was 12 bucks at petsmart on sale....

ErikHags said:

well shit listen to the veterans...
but my aquarium heater was 12 bucks at petsmart on sale....

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Great price! But it could be eliminated if the temperature is naturally like that of an incubator. Common rule, there's nothing veteran about that

my temps are low 70s and growth can come almost to a complete stop for days at a time ive been colonizing the same jars for three weeks, i like it cold in my house so i need an incubatori keep them in a cooler but it still right at 70 and three weeks for 60 - 75 colonization is not fast enough for me. they still get contaminated one by one any ways i been sloppy while inoculating with broken up pf cake chunks i had 7 im down to four

SUB'ED, always love to see shroom grows...i have no idea why

ErikHags said:

thanks guys. i totally agree grizzdude. my plan is to go bulk after this grow, this is just to get my feet wet, im a chemist not a mycologist

anyways, i was actually not too happy with the colonization speed thus far (especially since I got Cambodians just for their speed), but last night i shook the jars and aggitated them and they must have enjoyed it because they look much better today.

DAY 6
sorry about the shitty photo i have to use my iphone
View attachment 1086118

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Be careful with taking pics on ur iphone, they are gps tracked. go into your google maps and there should be a thing called places and it drops pins where ever u take pics