Growing Mushrooms in the garden, on purpose!

I hope you stay with us, LJM.  We never intend to offend anyone, only to help, especially if we think they may be beginners.

We are more likely to put off beginners if we treat them as though they know everything.

It reminds me of when I went to a local Family History meeting recently hoping for some guidance as I am new at it and wanted help with accessing the Ancestry.com site. I sat through a two hour meeting in a hot room being almost completely ignored and getting through the minutes of two past meetings then listening to a presentation of the Old Calendars (which I did appreciate) but went on and on. No questioning as to what I knew about researching etc. and how far I had got with ancestors. I had so many questions to ask that I knew would be easy for them to answer.  Very frustrating.

Will I return on March 7th? I just do not know, but I can relate to your frustration,
but there are many levels of expertise here and we try our best  to accommodate everyone.

OK, came across some intriguing information about fungus cultivation, and since I love my shrooms, I delved further. Always thought that growing mushrooms would entail dank basement activity, but turns out that there might be some spots in my yard that this could prove worthwhile!

http://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/grow-your-own-mushrooms-zmaz04onzsel.aspx?PageId=1

Might give it a try sometime! I have a shady area in my perennial garden where I have some hostas, and that might be the spot for an experiment!

Nice article and resources. I'm wondering why an indoor mushroom box can't be continuously fed. The mushrooms do drop their spores and it seems like they would recolonize.

sanderson wrote:Nice article and resources.  I'm wondering why an indoor mushroom box can't be continuously fed.  The mushrooms do drop their spores and it seems like they would recolonize.

The substrate becomes exhausted; there is no more food for the organism. That is why there is mushroom compost on the market, they sell the old substrate which is good humus , adds tilth to the garden soil, or in our case, Mel's mix.

Scorpio Rising wrote:OK, came across some intriguing information about fungus cultivation, and since I love my shrooms, I delved further.  Always thought that growing mushrooms would entail dank basement activity, but turns out that there might be some spots in my yard that this could prove worthwhile!  

http://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/grow-your-own-mushrooms-zmaz04onzsel.aspx?PageId=1

Might give it a try sometime!  I have a shady area in my perennial garden where I have some hostas, and that might be the spot for an experiment!

If you try it, lets us know. I have super shady hosta beds, too.
CC

I definitely will, CC, it is kinda pricey to get started as I look into this further. Probably not this year, but a possible future endeavor?

http://www.mushroom-appreciation.com/grow_mushrooms.html#sthash.8zHpbLCM.dpbs

Sounding more fun......

Relative to growing mushrooms in SFG on purpose, my (happy!) accidental mushroom experience may be helpful to others considering attempting to grow them intentional.

I've had multiple small unknown species pop up, both in the beds and on the paths, so some larger purple-ish ones popping up were initially unremarkable ... but after glancing at them several days in a row I realized they had obtained a familiar shape ....

Blewits are an edible species I learned to identify from an expert, but I'm only comfortable eating with a spore print to confirm ID (cut the stem off, place the cap off on half black/half white paper, cover to prevent drafts, spores drop from the gills and when enough fall out you can see what color they are - the black/white paper provides contrast regardless - fun to try at least once even if you don't plan on eating wild mushrooms.) (Do not eat wild mushrooms unless you are absolutely certain of the exact identification - preferably via training by an expert.) The pinkish beige spore print confirmed my ID and I've been enjoying eating these mushrooms (well cooked, and not too much at once of course.)


(yes.. distracted by the beautiful background while trying to photograph some of the blewits...)

The blewits are growing in/around the bed that I had attempted to compost in for most of a growing season, and then gave up since nothing was happening, and put MM over the top this spring. The attempted compost was a mix of oak leaves, weeds, grass clippings, coffee grounds, and horse manure.

An important part of ANSFG/SFG is spacing. But unlike plants, we don't have a say about where the top part of the fungus (the mushroom) will pop up. Since blewits fruit in the late fall, the mushrooms are only interfering somewhat with the brassicas and leeks remaining in the bed (the cukes, squash, and beans are done.) But with different timing or younger plants, these mushrooms popping up all over could disrupt/shade out young seedlings. Ergo, for intentional fungi in the SFG, you'll probably want a type of mushroom where you can keep the substrate in a limited space -- such as a log for oysters or shitakes -- and not a general compost growing species like blewits, portabellas, and store button mushrooms.

I'm uncertain about how far wood-chips growers like King Stropharia would travel from their substrate to fruit. Ideally, such a species would allow one to use one's wood-chipped paths both as paths, and for growing a crop...