Well on monday im buying an ounce of shrooms (how yummy ), and ive read that when you buy shrooms in bags many times a black dust will form in the bottom (spores, but when i bought 7 grams a week ago in a bag, no black dust formed but tiny pieces from the gills im guessing), so i was wondering if you can either use the spores that fall in the bottom of the bag to innoculate a sterilized rice cake or are the spores probably contaminated already? And if there is no spore dust, can i just use the tiny pieces that fall to the bottom of the bag that probably have spores in them? Pleaes dont tell me to go buy spores online, if you dont have anything to answer my question or help, then just dont post a comment. 36fuckin5, you seem pretty knowledgable about this topic, if you could help that would be greatly appreciated
There won't be spores in the bottom of the bag. It'll just be pieces of substrate and tiny, broken pieces of mushrooms. If you want spores, you're gonna have to buy them or get good at taking clean prints from the wild. You can also check out Free Spore Ring Europe. They'll send you spores, but they want donations back when you're done.
Well wouldnt there be spores in the dried gills of the mushrooms? Could i either flick them into the rice cake or just plant them in there or would there be too much risk of contamination? But could swear that i read somewhere either on the shroomery or on erowid that there are usually spores in the bottom of the bag
I mean, you could try it, but good fucking luck. I'm not that good. It's gonna take some serious skill with some agar.
agar? I was just going to use brown rice flower and pressure cook them. Ive been looking on the shroomery, but ive been having some trouble, if i want to grow them in cakes, would i have to use vermiculite?
Yes, you'd need vermiculite for cakes. If you pressure cook your spores, you're gonna kill them. The reason you'll need agar is because it's gonna have a lot of contaminant spores. You're gonna have to isolate the mushroom mycellium from the contams.
This last answer 36fuckin5 gave is pretty much dead on. You could just put all the shake at the bottom of the bag into some clean water and make a syringe. But the chances of contamination are about 95% or higher.
People tend to be very generous and helpful when it comes to these types of things, since there is often a belief that they're making the world a better place by helping out with spreading psychedelics. Poor people will likely spend money to send you what you need, the belief is so strong. I have never heard of anyone salvaging spores from a bag of dried mushrooms. I have, however heard of people rehydrating sclerotia and planting them in substrate, then harvesting fruit and depending on the strain, bigger sclerotia, amazing concept really. I'm not involved in any of this type of stuff, but I'm speaking the realness. This is all I can do to help, just saying this. Be careful too.
Yes, in theory there are spores in the bottom of your bag, but, as said before, the contamination risk is higher. Also, working with spores or mushie crumbs is going to impact you sterile technique. So...you're going to have have contam rates, likely. Also, spores used in syringes or prints are taken from fresh, wet mushrooms. The process of dropping spores is not passive, it is a mechanical process in which mature spores are "ejected" from the gills. So, any spores you can "knock" off a dried shroom is likely immature. Growing is going tto be an investment, so losing most of it to contams/dud spore material will be costly. Spores are cheap: $20 for 2 shipped. That way you know the strain, you are much less likely to have ccontams, and you don't waste all the time and materials on a dud grow. So, I know its not the answer you wanted, but bought or spore ring spores are likely to save you money in the long run. Just a thought. I think rehyrdating sclerotia is more viable than trying to collect spores, also. Cheers
Hmm, would i be able to buy agar at walmart or zehrs? And even if there were contaminants in the cake, would i be able to take the shroom that grows off the contaminated cake and make a clean spore print? Or should i try to grow an outdoor colony first and then if any shrooms grow off of that one i take a clean spore print off of that (i was thinking buying some horse manure, spreading that out somewhere, then spreading the stuff in the bottom of the bag and watering it) But say if i grew the shrooms off of a contaminated cake, would the shrooms have the same contaminants that the cake had?
No way. And honestly, if you don't know enough about agar yet to know where to get it, you shouldn't be working with it. It's really, really hard to keep clean, because it's a perfect medium for damn near anything. It depends on exactly what contam you get, but 99% of the time, you're fucked. Any time you're growing and see a contamination, you should throw it out. Not only does it put future grows at risk because of the huge spore load of most contams, but breathing certain spores can kill you. It's just all-around not worth it. There's about a 99% chance that won't work. If you already had some spawn, you could layer it with horse poo and straw and do an outdoor bed, if your climate is right. It's almost impossible to start an outdoor culture from spores, though. It depends on the contaminant. You should NEVER grow out anything that's contaminated, for the reasons stated above. If you really want to get started in growing, try this guide. If you're feeling really ballsy about it, you can try this one. It's a lot harder than the PF tek, though, and not really reccomended for beginners. I know you're excited to do this, but unless you wanna big batch of contaminated fail, take baby steps.
