The Manic Mushroom

[Atulip]

Hey everyone. After scouring my area for some good mushrooms, I've realized I'll need to grow my own. So I did a small amount of research, decided on the PF TEK method for growing. Ordered a bunch of stuff, then, after a little more research, I decided to go with Monotubs instead.

First I bought some spores online from a few different vendors. Golden teacher MSS from one, Wild Texas(Ordered TPE6, got WT) MSS from another, and Albino Penis Envy Reverted Spore Print from a third. GT arrived a few days earlier and found it's way on some Agar on 9-9, 9-12 for WT and APER.

Here they are on the 12th

With my spores down I prepared my tubs. Just some 58qt sterilite tubs from wally world. I have a few strains so I needed a few tubs... so I got 10. Drilled some 1.5" holes. I'll probably cram some poly-fil in the holes, but for now they're just taped up.

Here they are a few days ago, 9-16

Waiting wasn't working out for me so I found some Liquid Cultures on Ebay. Sounded risky so of course I decided it was a great idea. I got Z strain, Jedi Mind Fuck, and some Golden Teacher again, 2 from one vendor and 1 from another.

In the meantime I mixed and sterilized my Spawn. I had already ordered a bunch of Brown Rice Flour and Vermiculite, so I mixed up 14 Quart Jars at 1 part Brown rice flour to 3.5 parts vermiculite. Our pressure cooker is missing some piece so I just steam sterilized for 1.5 hours.

After spending a few hours working, I decided to be lazier from here on out... so I ordered a bunch of bagged up pre sterilized grain spawn and CVG for my bulk substrate.


The liquid cultures arrived today so we inoculated our BRF jars. 5 jars of Z strain, 5 jars Jedi Mind Fuck, and 4 jars Golden Teacher. Also shot a little Z strain into a liquid culture jar I purchased on ebay.

And now we wait...

 

[Atulip]

I've only experienced shrooms a few times, 2 grams at the most. It rarely shows up in my area.

Some Agar and 5lb bags of grain spawn I ordered arrived today.

I realized I shot up all my LC yesterday so I ordered more LC's. I do have this little bit of Z left.

Checked my spores on agar. Something weird on one of the Albino Penis Envy Reverted. So I thought I'd practice some agar work.

I cut out a few small pieces from the center and transferred them to the new agar.

Ok ok, now back to waiting....

 

[Atulip]

So these non inoculated grain spawn bags keep staring at me. Haunting me with their wasted potential. I don't have anymore LC yet, but I do I have a multi spore syringe of Wild Texas, and a print of Albino Penis Envy Reverted. There was a Golden Teacher multi spore syringe but it looked like only water was left. With the APER isolating in new agar cups, I figured I'd give it a bit more time and try to properly isolate one colony. But this Wild Texas is growing... wild... so I decided to shoot up the rest of the MSS directly into a 5lb bag of spawn.

Lets check on our BRF jars.

Now we have 5 jars of Z strain from liquid culture, 5 jars of Jedi Mind Fuck from lc, 4 jars of Golden Teacher from lc, and now 1 bag of Wild Texas from multi spore syringe. I went ahead and ordered some lc's of Enigma, Jack Frost, Ghost, and MVP. I have 8 Monotubs drilled out and ready to go, a couple spare tubs. Not sure exactly how much spawn I'll actually need, aiming for a 1:1-2 Spawn to bulk substrate ratio. And if my math is right I need 2.8 gallons for 3 inches, so 3 to 5 quart jars of spawn per monotub. 4 more bags can be inoculated, and I've ordered 4 more lc's conveniently. I forgot all about the APER when I ordered those, so I'll need to fix up a 9th monotub.


Ok guys I'll probably update again in a few days to inoculate the rest. Then, THEN, I will be patient.

 

[Atulip]

Ghost LC arrived today. Injected a little into a grain spawn bag.

Scraped out the mycelium in one of the Albino Penis Envy Reverted agar cups then shot it into a grain bag.

Checked on my Z liquid culture jar, still had the grain bags out so one got shot up with Z.

Lets check our grain jars.

Just waiting on Enigma and Jack Frost to ship now. And for MVP to arrive.

 

[Atulip]

Bad news. We've got cobweb mold. I can spot it in at least half the BRF jars. Took the GT's and found a nice place outside for them. The Z and JMF I left in their jars and sealed them in a bucket, just want to see what happens to them in a couple few weeks.

With my mood down a bit I needed a pick me up. Let's play with some agar. Took the GT petri dish I had from spores and selected a couple small colonies from it and transferred to new agar.

Some kind of booger growing on the side here.

I really love this Albino Penis Envy Reverted, so thick and fluffy. So I transferred one of my remaining 2 cups to a liquid culture jar. I used 18ga needle here, 16 or maybe even 14 would've been better. It was a bit difficult to slurp up the mycelium.

 

[Atulip]

Good news. MVP arrived today. A 5 pound colonized bag of MVP.

Time to prepare the monotub. A 5 pound bag of colonized millet looks like a little more than half the volume of a 5 pound bag of CVG.

The bags of grain I have look closer to a 1 to 1 ratio in volume. Less moisture? Lower density? Bigger grains = more space between? I didn't weigh anything so maybe it's more or less than 5 pounds? Could be any number of things.

I mixed a 5 pound bag of CVG and the colonized millet in my monotub.

That brought it to about 2 inches thick.

I opened the other bag of CVG and sprinkled about a half inch layer on top.

Replaced the packing tape with micropore tape, misted the sides and top, tossed it up on the top shelf, and now we wait.

 

[Atulip]

It has been about a week since the first round of grain spawn bags were inoculated. Thought I'd check on their progress.

The 2 on the left I got from Amazon are unspecified whole grains. The 2 on the right are millet and whole oat grains from Booming Acres.

Ghost and Z (Amazon whole grains)

I can't see any growth for the Z and Ghost.


Albino Penis Envy Reverted and Wild Texas ( Booming Acres millet and whole oat grains)

Since I was already handling the bags I broke up the mycelium and mixed it up in the bag.


I'm not seeing anything on the Amazon grains, but they are all different varieties. A couple days ago I inoculated a bag of the millet/oat grains with Z and a bag of the Amazon grains with APER. That should give a better idea if the grains are the problem. They were both similarly priced at a little over $3 per pound shipped.

Lets check on our liquid culture jars.


APER at 5 days. You can see a tiny amount of growth at the bottom

Z at 12 days now

Took a peek at our Agar. Looks like that booger from the Golden Teacher petri dish followed us to the new agar. Just tossed them in the trash. I've given up on GT's now.

Next update I'll include the MVP Monotub. Just misting it occasionally right now. I would've ordered another 5 pound colonized bag in a different variety but they're all sold out. I'll probably just order some more bags of grain from Booming Acres. Enigma and Jack Frost haven't arrived or even shipped yet. I'm really interested in enigma so I may source it from another vendor.

 

[Atulip]

Just a little peek at our MVP monotub at 1 week old now. Hopefully we'll see pins next week.

Lets check our APER liquid culture and agar.

More grain spawn and some LC's should be arriving today, I'll probably shoot up a few bags later. Otherwise we're just patiently waiting now.

 

[Atulip]

Welcome back to another exciting week at The Manic Mushroom. Mostly just tried not to touch anything for the last week. Anyway, let's get to it.

Looks like the MVP monotub has slowed down a bit. Still not seeing pins.

I worry the uncolonized spot might indicate contamination. I think the casing layer is just a bit too thick there though.

Down to the grain bags...

Here's Wild Texas from spores. Gave it a good break and shake.

Our Albino Penis Envy Reverted. Originally spores to agar, isolated a colony, then moved to LC. Gave it a good break and shake.

I'm seeing zero growth on the Amazon grains. Time to toss them, they're taking up valuable shelf space.

Speaking of zero growth. Ghost has shown us zero growth. I'll give these bags another week then inoculate them with something else.

Was a little worried Z wasn't growing either now.

It was just hiding on the bottom.

A little Jedi Mind Fuck at a week.

Enigma and Jack Frost both looking good.

More APER. Hard to see but the growth is there.

Lets check on the Agar and LC.

APER looking good.

Squirted some Enigma LC on agar when I got it. Looks interesting. Kinda bubbled up.

Taking a look at our LC it looks like there's more APER mycelium than Z now.

That's it for this week. If anything new happens I'll update again, otherwise just playing the waiting game now.

 

[Atulip]

Looks great in there - I just did my first run, it was a bit of a failure but I got a few. I plan on using .2 in capsules for microdosing for depression.
View attachment 1526482
That was the best one of the lot. Grown only in grain, I think it was far too dry as nothing happened, then I got bored and added a fair bit of water to wetten the block and then the first few came out. But most were small and bruised and sort of stopped growing.

Going to follow along to learn as you have it down nicely!

Cheers
Z

That's a good looking shroom. And I'm mostly just winging it here; there's a ton of information to take in. And this is my first grow, so I may fail completely lol. I'm mostly interested in a nice big trip, but also interested in microdosing for depression. I'm hoping to have some shrooms for Halloween. Just need this MVP to hurry up lol.

Completely blew the budget on this whole thing. Thought we had a dehydrator, we don't. So this was the dehydrator in budget. Looked bigger in the pictures before I bought lol.

Also took a couple seedling mats and stapled them to the underside of the shelves for the bags of grain. Should help with the colder temps coming.

Just took a peek at my spare amazon bags(found the brand, it's SeaSpores). One is full of maggots. How does this even happen?

Took all the SeaSpores grain bags and dumped them outside.

Decided to open up the initial BRF jars that contaminated. Looks like they all pretty much just stalled.

Found a nice spot and dumped everything outside then covered it with some potting soil.

Now they're in nature's hand.