logs inoculated with shitaki and oyster spore

My first post ever on this site....

2 years ago I innoculated 5 types of logs with shitaki or oyster spore. After letting them set some weeks we "planted" them end down into the soil in a periodically swampy wooded area near to a pond. They fruited a little but not much. Anything this year seems to have frozen in early development. Is all lost or is there something I ought to do to re invigorate them?

Patricia,

We cover a lot of these things in the book, I'll plug that at the end. A couple of things I see that may be causing you not to have banner fruiting.
Shiitake- loves oak, we also had great success with Beech (alder and hard maple do real good also) Oyster is not a fan of oak but Aspen and poplar trees (also mulberry) So depending on what you used tree species wise that may have a real impact on your mycelial run.

I never "planted" shiitake logs (reishi, lions mane and nemeko we did) I even went so far as to put pine shredding down and putting my logs on pallets, this way existing mushrooms could not colonize the log. Shiitake are not as aggressive as oyster, and there are mushrooms out "in the woods" that more aggressive.

You also need to have a proven spacing for your holes, each species is a little different. Also I hope you sealed your inoculation sites, if you did not wax them they will dry out, and insects will eat the spawn also.

"Frozen" will not affect shiitake they can freeze solid, their caps will crack but the will resume growing. Oysters can take a freeze, but not for a long period of time.

Also the strain you used will vary in it's time from inoculation to fruiting. We used to have a cold weather strain that took 1 1/2- 2 years before we saw mushroom, they were awesome but they took a long time. I also do not know where you live ie. your climate which will also affect your mushroom growing.

Hope some of this helps and lastly for a beginner www.mycelialmayhem.com and you can order a copy that covers everything above plus so much more.

Dave

I'm glad to hear that it can take longer for the shitakes to fruit. We innoculated alder logs early last spring (smallish--about 4 inches in diameter and a few of the branches that were about 1.5-2 inches) and I though for sure we'd be harvesting by now. One the the little branches popped out a mushroom in early spring this year so I soaked all the little ones for 24 hours in my rain barrel since they fit. But nothing has happened since then.

I'm also wondering if watering them with city water makes a difference. We have to water our logs with the hose because they are too far/uphill from the rain barrels.

I will look into your book--I haven't really done enough reading on the topic.