Subtopic	Posts		Updated
	3M's Dung Tek	1		04/08 02:19pm

By Hippie3 (Hippie3) on Sunday, April 08, 2001 - 01:47 pm: Edit

PSiLO187's Simple Bulk Spawn Production Tek v.6.6.6.2
Worm Dung, Straw, and Grain

I. Grain Spawn 101

Jar Preparation and Assembly:

Ok assuming you have already learned how to cultivate via the PF Tek,
lets talk a little bit about jars. The ½ pint will no longer do for
production if you are planning on using spawn. The best jars I have
found are the ½ gallon wide mouth jars that you can purchase from many
different sites on the internet or go to a local hardware store (Ace
Hardware has been known to have them). If you cannot find 1/2 gallon
jars, the quart jars do great also. You will be able to fit 4 ½ gallon
jars in most 22quart and larger p/cookers, that is 2 gallons of grain
per cook (think about it). Another thing you will be using is either
Poly-Fill (synthetic cottony stuffing for pillows) which is available
at
almost any Wal-Mart or wide mouth filter disks that are sold from Fungi
Perfecti (www.fungi.com) or The Mushroom People
(www.mushroompeople.com). Many people prefer to buy the plastic lids
available at fungi.com versus the metal lids, either will be fine
though. The first step in creating a new shake jar is to drill a hole
in
the mason jar lid. Make the hole about the size of the end of your
pinky
finger (maybe about .4 of an inch). Next you will pull out a hand-full
of Poly-Fill and pull it TIGHTLY through the hole. It is a good idea to
pull of too much excess Poly-Fill, the only reason it is there is to
keep out contams, not fill the whole jar. If you are using filter disks
simply make the hole a little larger and put the disk under the mason
lid.

Grain Preparation (to be used as spawn)

Now that your jar lids are fully assembled you are now ready to see
the
beauty of grain spawn. First and foremost you must realize that various
grains usually work fine so you will be able to mix and experiment with
this as you start growing in this fashion, but to make this tek simple
lets just say we are using Rye or Barley. Ok some people prefer boiling
(or steeping rather) their grain, some prefer to soak for a day or
more,
and some even prefer to just add a given amount of water straight into
the jar and pressure cook with the grain. The reason this is done is to
hydrate the grain and release endospores that are known to cause contam
problems. All of these methods seem to work. Basically you want the
grains to have water in them and not have them explode or burst or get
too soggy. Using the pressure cooker with no lid or even a bucket does
this fine. Whether you put the grains in hot water (not quite boiling)
or soak overnight the main thing you will have to watch out for is
starch. After I have prepared the grain bye steeping or soaking I
ALWAYS
THOROUGHLY RINSE all the slimy carbohydrates/starch and funk off of
your
grains and DRAIN *VERY* THOUROUGHLY before you pressure sterilize your
grains. The reason for this is because you will have a fatty
caramelized
mess in the bottom of your jars when they cool, which prevents the
nifty
shaking feature of grains jars and slows rhizomorphic
Mycelial networking.

Filling the Jars

This is pretty simple. Fill the jars between 3/5 and 3/4 full. The
grains will expand as they are sterilized somewhat, depending on how
water logged they are. Screw the lids on of course. Put foil over the
lids the same way you would in the PF TEK to keep water out during the
pressure sterilization. I recommend using masking tape to hold the foil
on, but this may not be necessary, I do it out of habit though.

Sterilizing the Grain

After you have filled the jars you are ready to sterilize the grain. I
am sure you have heard about many different times being used to
sterilize grain. I have only used one cook time as far as I can
remember
and I have had success with it so I had no reason to try any other. 70
minutes at 15psi, but when I say 70 minutes I am speaking of AFTER I
hear the first small hiss coming out of the pressure cooker. After the
70 minutes is up I take the cooker off the burner and let it cool down
(as much as possible) and then take the lid is off the pressure cooker.
I prefer to take the jars out of the pressure cooker warm or even HOT
to
make sure the grains are not sticky and are shakable before the jar
cools down. The grains tend to break up easier if the jars are still
warm. Let jars cool 100% before going to the next step of course...

II. Inoculating with Liquid Mycelium Inoculant or Grain Transfers

Creating Liquid Inoculant

I have read that alot of people use honey and sugar water to grow
mycelium for inoculations. I find this to be more time consuming than I
prefer. I actually prefer to clone strains I like from mushroom tissue,
but as this is a simple tek I am leaving all that out (you can do
research if interested in cloning with agar, that is a whole other
project all together.) When I had no petri dishes or cloned mushroom
tissue all I did was make water out of pre-existing colonized
substrate.
The easiest way to do this is to is to put some pebbles, coins, and/or
small objects of any sort that are able to sink to the bottom and tear
the mycelium once shaken aggressively) into a 1 quart jar full of
spring
water and sterilize. I poke 1 hole in the side of the lid to draw the
water out into the syringes and cover lid with foil as usual. Wrap 1
spoon, 1 fork, and 1 knife (100% metal, no wood) in foil. You will also
want to rinse and clean some syringes and needles and wrap them in foil
as well, to sterilize them too while you are at it. Most canners come
with another rack that can go on top of jars; this is where the wrapped
fork n knife will go, out of direct contact with the water. These
sterilized eating utensils are what you will be using to scrape
mycelium
and drop it into the cool sterilized water. Once everything is cooled
down 100% select a good jar of colonized grain, PF-TEK BRF cake, or
even
birdseed and make sure it is not contamed at all. Turn off your AC/
Heater in your house and spray Lysol EVERYWHERE around where you will
be
working. And wipe all surfaces as usual. Take the lid of and with the
sterilized tool of your preference scrape the layer of vermiculite off
if necessary, as it is trash and not colonized. Scoop a healthy few
scoops of mycelium colonized substrate into the sterilized water (I use
the spoon), and re-attach the lid. The foil I originally covered the
lid
with in the pcooker I put back on the jar. I place my finger over where
the hole is (the foil separates my finger from the water) and I shake
like a sick puppy. Never failed me once! The thing to watch out for,
though, is using the same strain over and over, generation after
generation, and not doing it from a master; this causes the strain to
degrade after 3 or so times.

Inoculating with Liquid Inoculant

This is the easiest part. In a very clean environment draw water out
of
the quart jar containing the liquid inoculant. I pretty much use 1
whole
syringe per ½ gallon jar. But make sure that you don't add TOO much
water, or your risks of bacterial contams are higher. If using
Poly-Fill
insert the needle between the side of the lid in the hole and the
actual
Poly-Fill (Don't insert it smack dab in the middle of all the polyfill
material). If using filter disks crack the lid open barely (dont breath
in there!) and squirt, squirt, squirt. Viola!

Inoculating with Grain/Substrate Transfer

Simply take sterile colonized substance and transfer it into the
virgin
spawn. Must be very sterile conditions, use the tools you sterilized.
There are teks out on this in detail as well.

Colonizing and Shaking of the Jars

The more you shake the jars is not necessarily the better they will
do.
Shake the jar once every 2 days or so. Once the grain has mycelium
pretty evenly distributed it is time to stop touching the jars all
together. They should be colonized within 2 weeks (give or take a
little).

III. Creation of Bulk Substrate with Straw and Worm Casting Compost

Okay, this is where all the fun really begins. I have experimented
with
different types of growing medium and found both wheat straw and worm
casting compost to be the best. Both do fine by themselves but worm
castings seems to do better than straw. But the straw is so incredibly
cheap per bail and the casting compost from mushroompeople.com costs a
bit more because of shipping. So to this my recommendation would be to
mix the 2 together. It is very simple.

Pasteurizing the Worm Dung

This is pretty simple. The hardest part is getting the water ratio
right. Basically use good judgment and make sure you don't make muddy
sludge just wet it good but not to where it is dripping and shit. Some
recommend putting lime in your worm compost, but it is not a very big
deal. Put this wet worm shit into large pie tins, put foil over the
tins, and preheat the oven to 160f. Leave the tins in the oven around
about 1hr 30mins. Let cool off completely, 100%.

Inoculating the Worm Dung With Grain Spawn

After the worm castings are pastuerized and cooled off you will now
need to inoculate the worm castings with grain (or birdseed) spawn. You
will need an opaque container that is large enough to hold the worm
castings . It is best to poke some holes in this container and set a
paper towel over the hole to prevent stuff from falling in them. Put
all
the pastuerized worm casting in this container and mix about 2 (or even
3 if you like) 1/2 gallon-sized jars (a total of 1 gallon of spawn) and
mix the spawn (colonized substrate) from the jars into the worm dung.
Within a few days this will be colonized 100%.

Pasturizing the Straw

First cut the straw as small as you can get it 1"-2" is fine; Shears,
scissors, whatever. Get an old pillow case or sheet and put straw in it
and tie a string around the top of the pillow case or sheet to hold it
all in. Put this pillowcase or sheet that is full of straw in the base
of a large pressure cooker or some other large metal container that can
withstand the stove-top. I use a really large metal tub that old timers
used to wash cloths in, this fits on all 4 burners on the stove. Fill
this with water and set a weight on top of it to prevent it from
floating. You will need to keep the temperature close to (***but
definitely less than***) 160f. If you go too far over this you are
destined to failure. Let it cook in this for 1hr. 30min. and make sure
there is always a good amount of water in it so it will not burn. A
candy thermometer is a good way to tell what temperature it is in the
pot, you can buy these at Wal-Mart. After it has been 1 hr 30min take
this out and let it cool off *100%* and make sure that the straw is
THOROUGHLY DRAINED.

Mixing Colonized Worm Dung Compost into the Straw Substrate

Ok this is another cool part. Take a sterile Rubbermaid clothing bin
(again from Wal-Mart) and duct-tape the bottom 6 inches of it to block
out light from hitting the substrate from the sides. I recommend 1 full
pillowcase to a 10 pounds of colonized worm casting compost (they sell
them by the 10lb bag at mushroompeople.com). Mix both of the colonized
worm casting and the straw into the Rubbermaid Sterilite container.
Make
sure you compress the straw/dung mixture as much as possible, if it is
TOO fluffed out it is not a good thing. Another adaptation is to take
additional colonized worm dung compost and make a pseudo-casing out of
the it, this keeps the straw from sticking through the casing layer.
Let
ALL of this colonize 100%, it wont take long AT ALL. After it is
colonized 100% case normally with Gro-Brick Coconut Fiber (or
peat/vermiculite). Put a light on the sterilite lid and soup the tank
up
however floats your boat. Growing parameters are the same of course.
Fyi: The straw mixture in the sterilite container seems to keep
humidity
optimum without any aditional humidification. Fresh air exchange is all
that is needed. Expect a VERY, VERY high yield.

Thanks and good luck.