david sewak

Maria,If you can get them there-don't know the rules/regs both Field & forest and Fungi perfecti sell grow kits-they are 5 lbs bags that are self contained. You can do them under the sink-on a counter, all you have to do is create a "tent" of plastic over them-to keep humidity in. Then mist them a couple of times a day just watch them. *If your water is treated I would find a different source-we had a number of folks kits go south-I figured out they were using "city" water!

Alex we just kind of let them do their thing. If you listen to the podcast I did you'll hear where I talk about how our Wine Cap Mycelial mat seemed to protect out tomatoes from late season blight! I know all about chitin-that's why you can't eat them raw No offense to salad bars and boring white buttons every where!!

D.Logan,

As far as I know I only ever knew of one operation that had success cultivating them. With the price range jumping around, to the best of my knowledge they went under when there were a couple of banner years in a row that drove the price down. No matter whether wild collecting or cultivating your profit margins are not astronomical. We always cultivated as wide a range of species as we could and supplemented them with wild gathered. Morels,Chantarelles, Miatake, Boletes,and chicken of the woods were species we would supplement or income.

As for Morel cultivation it is the holy grail of mushroom cultivation, Me personally I never had success were we could market them. Unlike the regular mushroom "life cycle" which is a straight circle, morels have a "cut off growing from the sclerotium-which is why I think they are so fickle to cultivate and also why they are un-predictable in the wild. But that's what probably makes them fun to hunt!

Dave

I have had a blast "talking with so many of you" I did a podcast this week on our book and my life, and of course how mushrooms play a role want to take a listen go to: http://www.permaculturevoices.com/growing-mushrooms-in-the-garden-and-growing-mushrooms-for-as-a-business-mycelial-mayhem-with-dave-sewak-pvp128/

Alex not to plug my book...oh wait yes I do, I have a whole series of uses for that. We created raised mounds, used logs for garden structure (herb wheels, raised beds, Asparagus and Jerusalem artichoke beds) I photo document and explain these methods you can utilize! For me there never is any waste, just another use that hasn't been thought of! There are so many ways to to incorporate your mushroom substrates it boogles the mind, and only your imagination can limit it!

Not sure where you live or what type of leaves you are composting. That seems to be very important also. For me in Pa (oak, grass clippings, and kitchen scraps were the norm with a flock of free rang chickens tearing the sh*t out of it was what we built our compost from. LIke I said earlier we could grow them but never in a marketable amount.

Prepare as in cooking? Or prepare as in Growing? Pinks, Golden and Kings we did primarily on grow bags Pinks especially we did indoors, due to their hatred of cool weather <55 degrees! The blues we did on logs, totems, Logs, Stumps, and steel grey ones. We also did pure whites too. It's just in the spawn you buy and how you want to grow them. Hope this helps.

Dave

I had some success with them, but limited in Pa. We had a compost pile, and I utilized the "super rich" bottom layer, and planted that, then added leaves (wet breaking down worm infested layer) and then some broken mulched up leaves. It did work but they were limited, no marketing just for us.

Not sure if this helps or not.

Dave

I'm partial to log grown, especially the cold weather strains that take a year plus sometime closer to 2 years until fruiting. We had them on Oak (Both white & red), Beech, Poplar (fast run, big fruitings collapsed logs afterwards) Yeah the fruiting log, a grow kit anything with a fruit body drew them in. Pink oyster, golden and King were all eye catchers too. I liked selling my "crooked" logs at shows, they ticked me off when were stacking, rotating etc. but people loved them-"artsy" I guess? We also did classes which were a big hit, they are fun and can make you some but you almost have to do them when your running crazy, oh yeah and wrote a book!

I think you will find the book an easy ready. with a lot of common sense approaches. Mushrooms are fun and fantastical element of our world all too easily forgotten. "When you sit in the woods and are hit by the rich forest smell that is part mushroom too!" I think too many people forget fungi are one of the five kingdoms of life!