Wild Oyster Mushrooms in yard

This week we have had a lot of rain, one night receiving almost 2inches, which has left humid days. Today I noticed, what appears to be, an oyster mushroom on the corner of our walkway. I will post pictures tomorrow.

Can oyster mushrooms be confused with other mushrooms?
What is a good way to save some surrounding debris to try to "inoculate" another area
I am just starting to be interested in growing mushrooms, what are some good beginner books?

I was so excited when I saw this beauty outside that I giggled

This page has some useful links to pages where you can download books and stuff on mushroom growing.

http://www.epogee.co.uk/page.php?28

Can oyster mushrooms be confused with other mushrooms?

Yes, it is certainly possible for a beginner to mistake other mushrooms for oysters. Posting photos will allow others to help identify your mushrooms. Tree oysters typically grow on trees, logs, stumps, or other woody debris.

I am just starting to be interested in growing mushrooms, what are some good beginner books?

See this thread for mushroom cultivation resources:

https://permies.com/permaculture-forums/5543_0/fungi-/fungi-cultivation-resources

Here are two photos from the top:

As for as woody debris, they seem to be growing on the debris of Azalea
One from as low as I could go:

Beautiful! Definitely oysters. Note the white spores dusting the ground under the gills. Very good photographs, by the way.

Mycelium Running, by Paul Stamets, has tips for wildcrafting mushrooms. His other book, Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms, is a bit more advanced, aimed at the commercial grower.

You could try transplanting the mycelium to new beds of fresh wood chips. You might wish to just add more wood chips to the current spot and let the mycelium colonize those fresh chips over the next few months to build up a larger reserve, so to speak, that you then move.

frankenstoen wrote:
Beautiful! Definitely oysters. Note the white spores dusting the ground under the gills. Very good photographs, by the way.

Thank you for the compliment. I had a few photos of underneath the oysters, however I enjoyed this one because it focused on the spore area.

frankenstoen wrote:
You could try transplanting the mycelium to new beds of fresh wood chips. You might wish to just add more wood chips to the current spot and let the mycelium colonize those fresh chips over the next few months to build up a larger reserve, so to speak, that you then move.

I like the idea of building the reserves. Should I just put the wood chips over the current area and allow for the mycelium to work its way throughout it or should I mix it in?

I also appreciate the resource links.

Should I just put the wood chips over the current area and allow for the mycelium to work its way throughout it or should I mix it in?

Darned good question. I don't really know the answer. Disturbing the mycelium too much can kill it, but disturbing it a little can actually inspire it to grow.

Outside of Asia, mushroom cultivation is a relatively new science. Most of what we know is from sterile laboratories and climate controlled grow rooms. Learning to grow them reliably outdoors is a bit of a pioneering experiment at this point.

Then it seems that I will just have to join the pioneers!

The Oyster mushroom has no poisonous lookalikes in North America (wiki). Commercial growers sometimes use straw - baled or put tightly into bags to grow the Oyster.

In the wild (Missouri) it seems to love a hardwood tree (Beech Willow +others) that has reached a certain age of decay. The pic in wiki shows a tree that is standing dead with the bark split open. The stage that a dead tree loses its bark seems to me to be the best age of wood to use to place around your spot. (I would not try too hard to move it - just try to add a few logs around it.)

The reason that it seems to like the dead tree with splitting bark ,i think, is because it has a place to spread its mycelium (sorta analogous to root hairs) under the bark and then also a place for the heavier 'fruiting' mushroom to anchor itself. Sometimes it will also keep growing on a hardwood that has split open (no or little bark). It spreads the mycelium down in the split.

wiki piki:

if you want to encourage that patch to grow I would add woodchips/sawdust on and around the spot and maybe take a little of the myc that is there and try running it out on  cardboard(the book mycelium running has details) and then you can use the cardboard to start new patches

Hmmmm, those caps seem to be awfully thin. What are the temps like in your region?