I have read the literature in a lot of different places, and they all say it is impossible/highly risky to use WBS as grain spawn unless you sterilize it with a pressure cooker. I just wanted some input from the pros here: are there any other ways to sterilize WBS? The Mushroom Man
A pressure cooker is the acceptable way of sterilizing WBS and other grains. Boiling substrate will only work for the PF-Tek. However you can try fractional sterilization: http://www.shroomery.org/5248/What-is-fractional-sterilization-or-tyndallization You could always just spawn your PF jars to dung or straw or other bulk substrates though.
Would that still work if the jars didn't colonize all the way? I'm growing some variety of edible (i'm lost on the name right now... reishi I believe), and while mixing the verm and brf, I either didn't mix it enough or didn't have enough brf because the cakes colonized and pinheaded but there were still sections of cake that got covered by some clear mycelium like stuff. It looks like it's just verm in those spots. If I broke the cakes apart, wouldn't I risk contaminating those uncolonized parts and fucking the whole thing up? The Mushroom Man
Definitely don't break up cakes if they are not 100% colonized. It sounds like you might have a contam problem though, I'm not the biggest mushroom expert around here, but I'm pretty sure that contams can be a pinning trigger. If the cakes are pinning but not fully colonized, you have a problem.
There are no signs of contams thus far. one cake died, but it was barely colonized at all. The others fruited one (only 1 each), then I soaked them and fruited them again and the second flush is much larger (12). Once I am done flushing them i will try to cut a colonized chunk off of it and use it to colonize something else. Thansk for the input, this site is a lot more useful than some other sites, even though i'm growing edibles The Mushroom Man
Sounds like you got wet spot or something. I bet those cakes will stink like hell when you open them. And for the record, you have to have a PC to sterilize whole grains.
