Mushroom Cultivation Update

Jan 14, 2025 | Gardens & Grounds

Written by Samantha Day, 577 Organic Garden Horticulturist

It has been a little over 18 months since my last blog about our journey to cultivating culinary mushrooms. I am happy to report we made some progress this past summer and fall with mushroom cultivation, and I finally have a chance to update you!

Almond agaricus is a mushroom related to portobellos and white button mushrooms. In 2023, I attempted to grow them in a shady bed of compost outside, but it turned out that it just wasn’t warm enough for them to produce much. This past summer, I tried again to grow them in the greenhouse. Using shallow compost beds placed on a greenhouse table, I kept the beds watered about every other day, and the mushrooms thrived in the greenhouse’s heat. I think we had about five big flushes between June and September.

Looking ahead to 2025, I know the mycelium won’t survive cool temperatures. To grow them again this summer, I’ll need to replenish the compost beds in the greenhouse by May and replant with more sawdust spawn. If you have a greenhouse or hoop house and you’re interested in growing some mushrooms, give it a try! I spent about $50 on spawn from Field and Forest to inoculate a shallow table bed approximately 3ft by 15ft.

In May 2024, I decided to try wine cap mushrooms and prepared a bed which fruited for the first time in October 2024. To prepare the bed, I laid cardboard directly on top of the grass under some trees (it should be relatively shady). Then, I layered straw, wood chips, and crumbled sawdust spawn in repeating layers until it was probably about 1.5 ft tall. The bed I used is long, maybe about 10-12ft long, by 3-4 ft wide. For this size of bed, I spent about $75 on sawdust spawn (three 5lb bags).

I kept it watered throughout the summer. The first flush was impressive—I would estimate a hundred or so wine caps emerged all at once, pushing out from throughout the sides and the top of the woodchip bed. I was able to take a bin of wine caps to SAME Café a few weeks in a row. Now that the bed is fully colonized and fruiting, I expect the bed to fruit intermittently for two to three years. It might even go longer if I keep topdressing the bed with more woodchips. This is an easy beginner mushroom to start with, it’s common for people to incorporate wine caps into portions of their vegetable garden.

Another success was shiitake mushrooms that finally appeared on oak logs that I inoculated in March 2023. It took them about 1.5 years to start fruiting, and that particular shiitake is a fall-fruiting strain. There haven’t been a whole lot yet—maybe only 10 at a time per log—but they’re coming slowly.

I have other logs that I inoculated in March 2024 with a spring-fruiting shiitake strain, so maybe we’ll see something from those logs in a few months.

In March 2024 we also inoculated a bunch of ash logs with chestnut mushrooms, and some mulberry logs with oyster mushrooms. We even tried a few random London Plane Tree branches with shiitake spawn. We’ll see what happens! It will take a while to see anything.

Other attempts include waiting to see if anything comes from a wood blewit mushroom bed that I inoculated in August 2023—no sign of mushrooms yet. I also put some morel pegs into the soil under some elm trees in April 2023, but there haven’t been any signs of mushrooms there either.

Another one of my attempts began in March 2023, I inoculated mulberry logs with lion’s mane pegs. I read that they can be very slow-growing and can take up to two years to colonize a log. Last year, a small turkey-tail-like mushroom appeared on those logs, which I assumed meant that the lion’s mane didn’t win the race to colonize those logs. So I put them out in the perennial beds to decompose. It’s possible that the lion’s mane could still fruit eventually on them, I’ll check every once in a while and see if anything has changed.

All in all, I’m really happy that some of these mushroom experiments are working. I think the wine cap was the biggest success for me, it was just SO productive. I couldn’t believe it — it was like a mushroom explosion! And the best part, they taste really great in soups.

In the “577” way, we’ll keep trying things, waiting, and seeing what works. I look forward to sharing more updates as things progress, so stay tuned, and if you’re growing mushrooms too, we’d love to hear how it’s going for you.

More Posts

Discovering with new eyes

Discovering with new eyes

For children, learning something new is an everyday experience. But as adults, we often resist the discomfort of being beginners. What happens when we embrace curiosity instead?

Reflections and Intentions

Reflections and Intentions

As 2024 comes to a close, Heather Gallant, 577 Executive Director, discovered the YearCompass handbook and asked our staff about their key moments and lessons from the year. Their beautiful insights highlight the meaningful experiences we’ve shared at 577. We hope your time here has brought you joy and connection, and as we look ahead to 2025, we encourage you to think about what you’d like to create and experience—perhaps some of that will happen with us!

Discover & Create: 50% Off Favorites! From now through February 28, enjoy 50% off books, magazines, puzzles, games, and art supplies. Curiosity Shop is open Monday-Saturday, 10am-5pm.

X