mycelium culture

[fungiphile]

This is my first ever post I do not have a pressure cooker but I use the steam sterilization for pf cakes of brf and verm, my question is this is there any practical way to use grains w/o the pc and if not can I use my pf cakes to inoculate more pf cakes, I have read 1 post about this that said contamination would be an issue if spooning colonized cake into another jar, could I maybe blend the cake with water to a fine consistency and use a plastic bottle with a long tapered point as a syringe substitute (like the kind that you squeeze that spray a stream of water ) or maybe I can sterilize a bag of pf substrate  and put my colonized cake in another bag crumbled ant put them both in a 3rd sterilized bag and mix it up if so how can I ensure that my bags are clean inside and out will Lysol kill mycellium or is this more trouble than its worth? these were just some things I was thinking if anyone has any ideas of their own or has tried any with success any help would be greatly appreciated I'm sorry for the length of my post i was just brainstormin and am new to using forums.

[anno]

For any more serious mycological work you are going to need a pressure cooker.

There is a way of using grains without a pressure cooker, but it is impractical, see http://www.shroomery.org/5248/What-is-fractional-sterilization-or-tyndallization .


>maybe I can sterilize a bag of pf substrate  and put my colonized cake in another bag crumbled ant put them both in a 3rd sterilized bag
>and mix it up if so how can I ensure that my bags are clean inside

This is very unlikely to be pulled off without contamination, but of course you can try.

See also http://www.fungifun.org/English/Mycelium

[fungiphile]

thank you for the info of course right after i posted i ran across all kinds of answers and some more questions and thinking of start with a cheap pressure cooker until i can afford a good one this is my first grow (although i have researched of and on for about 3 years and never got around to it) Ive learned more in the last 2 weeks) -_-and i am following pf tek from this site some of (7) my jars are almost fully colonized i have 7 1/2 pt. jars of B+ and 5 1/2 pt. gold coast. i started the B+ Feb 18 with a 20cc "dark moon" style syringe from earthstongue which is new one for me at first I thought i might have trichoderma because the darkness at the innoc. point from the dark black solution. thanks to this site I believe I can try my hand at casing 4 of the B+ I'm going to use the pf tek for the other 3 just in case so that i can at least make a spore print i was wondering what a newbie such as myself should use of the top of my head my options are from what Ive read is to
-simply crumble and case with verm (seems alot like dunk and roll tho)
-or 70/20/10 i think peat/verm/calcium
-or coco coir
-or straw
-or dung hell maybe both
- and the list goes on I'm sure but I'm getting ahead of myself I mean to ask the advice of the forum for a newbie (unfortunately w/o a pc at the moment) so if you could give me some advice on what you guys think would be my best bet so I dont end up trying
  everything which is OK but I end up wanting to try a little bit of everything at once and
bite off more than I can chew Ive already tried wbs i boiled it for 90 min about 6 days ago
i have no contams or mycellium but I'm going to give up grains until i have a pc and yesterday I innoc'd a liquid culture using club99s honeywater tek I'm very excited about that.and once again thank you very much for sharing your knowledge and patience with this very excited newb - is this post too long ?

[anno]

what a newbie such as myself should use of the top of my head my options are from what Ive read is to
-simply crumble and case with verm (seems alot like dunk and roll tho)
-or 70/20/10 i think peat/verm/calcium
-or coco coir
-or straw
-or dung hell maybe both

I would suggest 90% peat or peat based potting soil, 10% calcium carbonate or 60%  peat  or peat based potting soil, 30% vermiculite and 10% calcium carbonate.

Straw and dung are not casings, they are substrates, which have to be pasteurized first, then thoroughly mixed with spawn(such as crumbled pf cakes or any colonized grain), and after colonized, cased.

[fungiphile]

once again thank you for taking the time to lead me in the right direction the I was afraid that straw or dung colonized from pf cakes might be a bit tricky for my experience level (none) I was very tempted from what I read of huge yields thoughthis being my first grow I don't think my Patience would hold when I get a camera I will post pics of my labor and your wisdom with any luck will be a sign of good things to come. my next experiment will be liquid cultures or agar if you know of any exceptional teks out their that may be new to me thankyou for everything

[Gretchen]

To make LC from a pf cake just prepare your LC jars...do several cuz some will prob end up dirty...squirt sterile water in a colonized PF jar...or grain jar..whatever....shake around...suck out...and make LC...or noc up jars with the myc water!!

I have great poop for sale...no straw needed...prepasturized...open fedex box...add spawn...BAM!!! Great for monotubs or simple lazy invitro poo bags...providing you have a bag loving strain....check out the poop at:

http://gretchypoohobbysub.googlepages.com/home

LOVE AND LIGHT!!

[fungiphile]

can is still use (birth) that jar after I hit it with sterile water and shake it and draw water off can i add more sterile water and just "dunk" it in its own jar for 24h or will the shaking it be traumatic enough for the cake hell maybe i just eat the cake, also does any body know anything about those "new moon" highly contamination resistant syringes from earthstongue, is it just a spore syringe with black dye for marketing purposes since darker syringes seem to be sought

[fungiphile]

thank you for the link on the pc on amazon I went ahead and got the presto 23qt I realy apreciate it as far as I can tell you saved me at least 30$ and got me a bunch of extra qts. of room good lookin.

[Gretchen]

YES you can still use your pf cake once you have shot water into it.  And  for dunking I always found it handy to keep a set of lids without holes and just dunk in jars...silly things like to float...screw on lids r nice at keeping those buggers submerged. 

[fungiphile]

I found a cool post on using pf cakes a as bulk spawn I had read this somewhere before and am glad I found it again http://forums.mycotopia.net/fungi-growing-edible-medicinal-magic-mushrooms/30494-tv-guide-colonizing-quart-jar-three-days.html I cant remember if you have to join to read this forum or not, if you do I apologize but there is alot of good info there as well