I usually don’t grow in the summer due to the heat and I’m struggling to get my ass in gear for this winter. I usually have about 4 varieties I grow, blue oysters, pinks, lion’s mane and pioppinos.
I usually don’t grow in the summer due to the heat and I’m struggling to get my ass in gear for this winter. I usually have about 4 varieties I grow, blue oysters, pinks, lion’s mane and pioppinos.
Cool! That looks like a good harvest. Do you cull it all at once or pick and choose as you’re ready to eat them? Also, in terms of time and investment, how hard is it to grow your own?
We would pick all of this at once and either eat them, bag them up for family, or freeze/dehydrate. Especially important to pick the oysters and pioppinos because leaving them for too long can result in major spore dumping which it’s good for your lungs and we use a mask if that happens or if spending extended time in the tent.
We’ve invested a good bit of money into this, maybe a couple thousand or more? We’ve spent that over about 6 years, mostly outfitting the fruiting tent and HEPA flow hood. I would definitely suggest doing it on a budget at first, totally doable - I used to do lab work lab work in front of an air purifier and the fail rate was surprisingly low. I wouldn’t say it takes up a lot of time once you’re confident doing sterile work. I spend a lot of time cleaning as well as sterilizing substrate which takes about 3 hrs, but 2.5hrs of that is just babysitting the pressure cooker. I’m not sure if I would say it’s hard to get into but there is quite a learning curve and probably my ADHD-fueled love of mushrooms helped me get over that.