Anyone who knows growing, what do you think of my tek?

So, I'm wanting to step up from the PF tek. I've done it long enough, I know all the ins & outs, and I finally got a PC. Besides that, I've always had better luck with more advanced techniques. I can't fruit a cake for shit, but I can case it all day.

Anyway, I'm gonna be moving up to WBS now. I've read The Mushroom Cultivator by Stamets & Chilton, The MMGG by Oss & Oeric and Psilocybin Production (I forget the author) as well as a LOT of stuff online. Not bragging, just giving a little background info. I "wrote" this tek, and it's what I plan on using. I'm omitting the part about sterile procedure, I know that I know it. I was just wanting to get some other opinions before I go ahead. Here goes:


Liquid Culture

1.Boil 8 cups of distilled water in a large pot
2.Add 1 large potato, diced. Leave the skin on.
3.Turn heat to simmering and cook until the potato is done.
4.Prep jar lids with an inoculation hole (with polyfill) and a gas exchange hole. Cut Tyvek filters.
5.Strain off the potatoes, saving the water.
6.Filter out 4 cups of potato water through a coffee filter. Discard the rest.
7.Mix in 10 tablespoons of Light Karo syrup and 12 cups of distilled water.
8.Fill your jars with solution, making sure that the liquid level is high enough to be easily drawn into a syringe.
9.Pressure cook at 15 PSI for 30 minutes and let cool naturally.
10.Inoculate with 1-2 cc of spores and colonize at 78-82.
11.Once colonized, swirl the LC and draw as much as you need into a syringe.

Wild bird seed prep

1.Measure out enough WBS to fill your jars ¾ full.
2.Plug your drain with some balled-up aluminum foil.
3.Rinse the WBS well in a colander.
4.Put the WBS in a large pot.
5.Run hot water over the WBS to remove sunflower seeds and such.
6.Once the water runs clear, cover the WBS with about 2 inches of water, cover the pot with a lid and it soak for 24 hours at room temperature. It should smell fermented and take on a rusty color after 24 hours.
7.Strain the WBS and rinse well again in a colander.
8.Place the WBS back in the pot and cover with another 2 inches of water.
9.Simmer for 20 minutes, or until kernels start to explode.
10.Place back into the colander and rinse well one last time. Make sure to get everything off of the WBS.
11.Let the WBS drain until it doesn't clump up or stick to your hand when you touch it. This could take a few hours.
12.Fill the jars ¾ full and put the lids on.
13.Pressure cook at 15 PSI for 45 minutes and let cool.
14.Shake the grain like you're mad at it to redistribute moisture.
15.Inoculate with 2-3 cc of LC and incubate at 78-82 degrees F until you see full colonization.
16.To speed colonization, shake the jars again when 30-50% visible colonization has occurred.


Bulk substrate

1.Boil 1 gallon of distilled water per brick of coco coir in a large pot then turn off the heat.
2.Break up ¼ of a brick of coco coir per 6 qt Tupperware tub in another large pot.
3.Pour the water on the coco coir then cover for 45 minutes to let it absorb water, then tilt to pour off the excess.
4.Add ¼ to ½ cup of spent coffee grounds and stir well.
5.Line the bottom of the Tupperware with a black trash bag, making sure that it comes up the sides just a little.
6.Cut 2 holes on each side about an inch above where your substrate line will be and stuff them with Polyfill.
7.In sterile conditions, grab a handful of the bulk coir/coffee mix and squeeze the excess moisture out. Make a 3-4 inch layer in the tub on top of the vermiculite.
Pour 1 quart jar of colonized WBS into the coir/coffee and mix. Do not pack it down.
8.Cover with foil with a few holes poked in it. Cover the holes with micropore tape.
9.Incubate until colonized at 78-82 degrees. It should take about 5-6 days.

Casing and fruiting

1.Fill a large bowl with vermiculite.
2.Slowly add water, making sure to mix very well (very important) until the vermiculite only lets out a few drops of water when you squeeze it in a tight fist.
3.Pack a few jars with the moistened vermiculite.
4.Pressure cook for 45 minutes at 15 PSI and let cool.
5.Once your bulk substrate has colonized, take the tub into a sterile area and cover with a ¼ inch layer of vermiculite. Make sure not to pack it down.
6.Take another tub of the same size and put holes the same as you did with the first one. Stuff them with Polyfill. Tape the rims of the tubs together.
7.Keep at 68-72 degrees F until ready to harvest.

 

I don't know too much about LC, so I won't comment.

Personally, I would PC cook the WBS for at least an hour. For quart jars, I cook for 75 mins. I've never done pints, but I would do them for at least an hour.

Cheers

 

LC = shit
Why? You don't know if you have contam.
Plenty of perfect looking LC is actually contam'd when you do a knock up.

LC has little benefits ultimately, so why not go with g2g because you'll know immediately if you have a problem.

Straight verm is fine with casing layers but I have known better results w/ 50/50+ but ymmv.

 

I'm pretty sure I could spot a contamination in a jar of LC. It's clear, so the white should come through well. If nothing else, I can try 1 jar nocked up with LC and see if it contams. I don't want to do g2g because it's a lot more work. If I were gonna do that, I'd probably get agar. It'd be the same amount of actual working time.

 

i like LC, but i agree its almost impossible to spot contams in!

 

The reason I was gonna case with straight field capacity verm is this. I was thinking of using that exact Tek, but I have some coir lying around, so I figured I may as well use it.

I'm really not too worried about contaminants. I've got an entire closet lined with plastic, so it works just fine. Last attempt, I had uncolonized jars of LC and WBS that had been inocculated (bad spores) sitting around in my incubator for almost a month before I finally decided to throw them out. There wasn't a contam in any of the 3 LCs or 16 grain jars.

 

And you've obviously never made an LC before writing that. (Edit: the post you made while I was writing that reveals that you have, and I shouldn't be so arrogant, but you're still cocky if you think you'll be able to spot one)

Your plan sounds pretty good. Sushiosoyam makes a good point when he says that it is difficult to tell if an LC is contaminated, but in my experience it is more difficult to do a grain to grain transfer without contaminating it from exposing the mycellium during the transfer. If you are making the LC from a spore syringe, then chances are that you can do it without contaminating it if you have a good clean procedure, but it is more difficult to do from a spore print or a piece of live tissue. I would say to go with the LC because it is much faster than just using spores. Also, you say that you're just now moving up from the PF Tek, so it's not like you have any colonized grain jars laying around anyway, and you would most likely contaminate your grains if you tried doing the transfer with a BRF cake because you would have to touch it to break it apart.

Anyway, with your LC, you should skip doing the potato-water part and just use karo, molasses, or clover honey at a ratio of 4% of whatever you use with 96% water (1 tbsp per pint). I think the solution you have worked out would work, but you'll probably have better results with more water. I've never heard of people using potato broth in an LC; I'm not saying that it won't work because I have never tried or have read anything against it, but I think that most people use congealed potato broth as a substitute for agar. Additionally, there's no need to use distilled water since you will be sterilizing your LC before using it anyway.

Most people simmer the bird seed for around 45 minutes, but simmering it isn't even necessary. The most important part of preparing the grains is to make sure that they are drained enough before you sterilize them. To determine if they are, place your hand or a spoon into the grain, and if most of the grain falls off when you lift it, then they have drained enough. If a good bit sticks, then they are too wet.

Again, with your bulk substrate, you can just use tap water since you will be boiling it. Usually, a gallon isn't quite enough to hydrate most bricks of coir, so be prepared to add a little bit more. There are many different brands of coir bricks, so the best thing to do is to follow the instructions on the package's label. In my opinion, it is also much easier to line the bottom of your container with aluminum foil, as opposed to a garbage bag, because the foil will keep its shape and is thus less difficult to handle. You must ensure that your terrarium has enough vertical space as well.

Lastly, there is no need to put tape over the holes in the foil. Instead, put tape (you probably shouldn't use micropore tape for this part) over the holes that you will put polyfill into. You do not want fresh air exchange during the period when the BS and casing layer are colonizing. Once your casing layer has colonized, then replace the tap with wads of polyfill. Fresh air exchange, along with exposure to light and a slight drop in temperature, are factors that will help to trigger pinning. Keep your terrarium in the dark (covering it in black garbage bags works well) from the point where you spawn your grains until your casing layer is colonized. Also, I would recommend using the 50/50 mixture (look it up on shroomery) over vermiculite as well. If you end up using peat moss, then pasteurize it by heating it to 200 degrees for a few hours instead of sterilizing it.

You should also note that sterility isn't as important after you inoculate your jars. You need to maintain a clean environment when spawning to your BS, but you won't be able to keep it sterile. Colonized grains are fairly resistant to contamination because the cubensis mycellium will fight off competing molds, and bulk substrates such as coir are not as susceptible to mold spores, which is why they are used as bulk substrates to begin with.

 

I made 3 jars of LC, actually, but my spores weren't viable. I could definitely tell that there was nothing in it, though. And like I said, worst case scenario is that I do 1 test jar. I'm not fucking with a print whatsoever. I know of a Tek that lets spores drop directly into sterile water, so I'm gonna do that and make syringes. Fuck the G2G and spore prints. Those are pretty much outdated unless you're going way bigger than I intend to with it.

I got the idea for potato LC from here. If you look around at J-Shroom's posts, you can tell that he knows his shit. The general consensus that I've been getting is that there's no real advantage over a straight karo LC, so I'll probably just do that. I'm not using distilled water for it's cleanliness, I'm using it because the water here is very high in chlorine, and I don't wanna risk my spores. Bottled water is cheap enough that it's not much of a problem.

I've got that part down. I just didn't go into detail, because I wrote it mainly for myself, and I know the details like this.

Thanks for the tip on the foil. I didn't even think of that. I won't be using a terrarium, I'm going with a double tub (probably 2 64 qt tubs), which should be PLENTY of room.

What holes in what foil? As far as the FAE, I'll probably cover the holes with tape like you suggested. I've actually seen some experiments from home growers that suggest that temps and light don't really do much to trigger pinning. The way I've seen pinning triggers laid out is: 1st - lack of grain to colonize (they have nothing to eat, so they go "oh, fuck, we had better reproduce!"), 2nd - FAE (not sure why this is 2), 3rd - temperature drop of ~10 degrees F (because that's a sign that winter is coming & they won't be able to reproduce) and 4th is light, because mushrooms will pin just fine without light, as long as you provide the temp drop and FAE at full colonization. Not trying to sound arrogant here, although I come off like that. Please tell me I'm wrong, but tell me why.

Yeah, I understand this. I've got an entire closet lined in plastic, and I found a cool little Tek for a ghetto flow hood, so I think I'll be fine. When I bought the coir, I was thinking of casing with it, but I got to reading and found out it was highly nutritous, so I decided to use it as a bulk. The biggest reason I picked coir at all is because it's very clean.

 

Overall I'd say your 'tek' is quite interesting. No chance I'd go through all of that, but I'm glad you're doing it. Please let us know how everything turns out. Good luck.

 

I plan on keeping a grow log, probably on Shroomtalk. I may duplicate it here.

 

Cool man.