Mushroom cultivation questions

Hi to everyone.
I've been reading about mushroom cultivation for a month now approximately. Today i ordered liquid culture (lions mane, and oyster) But it is so much information that i need to cover , that one question leads to the other and i am always with new questions.So ...
For whoever has the time and is in the mood of helping ....i will try to ask for short answers i promise.
1. Can i use sawdust from my carpenters wood ? It's free but it's different kinds of wood mixed.Will it be impossible to grow ? Do i HAVE to go for specific trees.?
2. I got a normal pressure cooker. It doesn't give a pressure reading. Google says that pressure cookers reach in general 15 psi.But I can't be sure.
Is it ok to use this ?
3. Why people make only slits on one side of the inoculated bags? Wouldn't be better to make more slits and get more mushrooms?
4.I got already coco coir, sawdust, bat guano, gypsum, and rye.Should i do non organic substrate to lower the risk of contamination?

I find it very interesting and i want to start growing mushrooms and keep learning.I just dont want to do anything stupid now that its the begining.
And believe me i am reading all this time.
Thanks in advance for anyone who took the time to read and answer this long post

Hello Danny,

I will give a shot at this question.  Firstly, as far as sawdust goes, I am going to have to give you a very definite maybe.  A lot of the mushrooms that we like to grow and eat don’t care for conifer wood.  Apparently the sap inhibits fungal growth.  However, pine boards turned to sawdust *MIGHT* behave differently, but I just don’t know.  I have not grown either lions mane or oysters (but I would love like to soon!!), but I have grown wine caps and generally what’s good for wine caps is good for oysters.

I imagine that the pressure cooker wood work fine.

Regarding the slit sides, you don’t really need much more than those slits as the fungus will consume the wood and happily push out mushroom through the sides.  

If you have any other questions, please feel free to ask.

Eric

HI Danny, welcome to Premies!

I had great success growing Lion's mane in bags utilizing the Field & Forest technique of simply adding boiling water to sterllize the substrate. I highly recommend this method. No pressure cooker needed, easy peasy!  Check out this link, it has a post at the bottom on how to make Lion's mane blocks using this method.

    Anyone using Lion's Mane mushrooms for Brain Health

For what it's worth, I ordered my wood pellets from NorthSpore   https://northspore.com/products/100-hardwood-sawdust-pellets

They're made from a furniture maker leftovers (so no bark in the mix). They also sell the soybean hulls that are recommended in the Field & forest recipe.. Though they are a bit pricey (especially when you factor in shipping), the spawn run seemed to be quicker using the Northspore pellets than the pellets I purchased through that jungle website, I added in a little gypsum in subsequent batches, but it didn't seem to help my yields much.

I'm also interested in using sawdust to make the blocks, but didn't have time last year to experiment. Hardwood sawdust would be best , ideally oak and/or maple.

Hope that helps & let us know how you make out ....cheers!

Thank you so much .Conifer sawdust has that sticky resin so it makes sense to not be good for fungi.Today i learned that my sawdust is from some swedish pine.So i will mix it with some petrol and keep it next to my bbq .(Great firestarter)
Will keep you updated.

Birthday present!  Lifecyckel mushroom box.   Contents, mostly dried used coffee grounds mixed with what looked like chopped meadow hay, plus the culture for oyster mushrooms.  Whole kaboodle in a plastic bag, inside a box.   Water, leave to develop the white strandy stuff, cut slit in bag (convenient tear open place in the box)  then spray daily.  Lots and Lots of mushrooms.   Maybe there is too much mystery bandied about.
I've seen one liberated from its box, and set up from scratch  using guinea pig bedding straw as the "extra"  and a calico bag which conveniently had handles to hang it inside the shed.
Coffee grounds have been diverted from adding to plants that like an acid soil - but seriously there is enough to share