u/LouSpore

This is one of two high tunnels that will house 4 small beds, each with a different strain. A total of 13 beds will pobably be done (and inoculated) by the end of this week. We have to make sure moisture levels are right, buffering is given time to happen and that there isn't another heat wave in the forecast.

There's a great morel marsala recipe in this book I've made that I can't wait to try with my homegrown fruits: https://northspore.com/.../fantastic-fungi-community...

I've been doing a ton of research to complete this morel presentation and I gotta say, the story is really interesting and inspiring. Someone should write a book. This book by Michael Kuo (Mushroomexpert.com guy), called Morels, is legit and I just bought a copy. However, it's not really about cultivation and it's pretty old.

(https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/morels_michael-kuo/554124/?srsltid=AU7gw4WRWTl0JrKQNP0wear5a97048V8oBrrkf6XRMOYWL0h6_FY6J0e#edition=6340909&idiq=8222532

People tried to grow morels for a hundred years before anyone pulled it off with some confidence. The first real breakthrough was in 1982, a man named Ronald Ower fruited them in a lab at San Francisco State. He patented the method in 1985. It was granted in 1986... after he was already dead, killed in a street robbery in San Francisco months before. Or so they say....

The patent was real, but almost nobody could reproduce it. And believe me people put real money and effort into trying. The method sat there, described but unusable, for fifteen years. Then growers in Sichuan, China figured out the missing piece around 2000, a technique now called the exogenous nutrient bag, and turned morels into an actual field crop. Chinese cultivation went from about 200 hectares in 2012 to over 16,500 by 2021. And the newer Chinese patents credit Ower's original 1986 filing as the source of the idea. The yield, genetics and methods have all continued to improve rapidly.

Things are still tough though. Published field yields in China swing from zero to 3,000 grams per square meter on the same crop, and recent US on-farm trials only got morels on 11 to 30% of plots. That's not a discouraging number to me though! Maybe it isn't ready for commercial primetime in the west yet, but this is exactly the stage in a crop's history where the backyard gardener ro small farmer willing to run an odd experiment, actually moves the needle.

Just think about how much "hobbyist" magic mushroom growers have innovated in that space! Morels are ready for some of that kind of attention from Americans.

Love, Lou

We've been testing some new strains lately and the new strain of Pleurotus eryngii we've started is an absolute beast. It literally seems to rewrite our rules for this species.

Normally, we would really only top-fruit these bad larrys. They have to pin heavily in the bag and then require quite chilly temps for the best outcome. They can be prone to bacterial blotch if it's too warm and take a long time. It's an excellent option for cold weather growing and they're one of the best culinary mushrooms out there due to the meaty texture and adaptable flavor. https://northspore.com/.../grow-your-own-king-trumpets...

But these? They're faster, seem to fruit at warmer temps and popped just fine when side-fruited with no special pinning step. I'm going to top-fruit them for sure at some point and see what's that like.

I might not get back to working with them for a little while, but I'm really stoked to do so.

In the past few days I've gotten more pieces in place for our morel installations. I acquired an ibc tote so that we can allow city water to offgass all chlorine (possibly not necessary, but a good step nonetheless), got that tensiometer so I can monitor available substrate moisture of the beds, cleared old substrate from our planting locations and gotten a shipment of loam. This along with more planning and clearing means that we're almost ready for inoculations. We just have to wait for spawn to be ready and for conditions to be right.

What is loam anyway? Well I wasn't so clear on this, but loam is basically a more curated mixture of sand, silt, organic matter and clay. It's well sifted and, very important for morels, has lower nitrogen/organic matter levels than something like a raised bed mix.

Why is low nutrient substrate important? Well because we said so. For real though, morels seem to prefer a low nutrient substate to move into and create sclerotia from the spawn (super high nutrient). This may not apply to the apple and burn morels (honestly not sure), but does for the Ceramyca pod and surface spawn morel kits.

Check out the your morel cultivation options here: https://northspore.com/collections/morel

I've got pinks, blues, chestnut, Italians, lions mane and king trumpet in a MycoSphere and they're coming out so well!

I will say that some of the lions mane is getting a bit deformed, probably from being sprayed directly by the misters. I think this could easily be remedied by draping some plastic (or some toher cover) over the shelf above them. Besides that though, fresh air is never an issue, cleaning isn't as hard and I'm not seeing pests. I did add some BTi pellets to the wood chips and a few vineger traps just in case.

What's going on in your gardens as the season changes?

We've got 3x MycoSpheres, 2x hightunnels and 2x low tunnels planned for an array of morel experiments. I've got a lot to do to get ready! Today, I cleaned up one of the high tunnels and staked out the 2x low tunnels that will be alongside our forested path. The low tunnels will be quite small at 2'x4' each.

I've gotta work pretty much everyday this month to do this plus all the other things....good thing I love what I'm doing.

We will be testing a bunch of of strain/species, substrate and inoculation style combinations. I'll be posting numerous updates as this progresses.

Anyone else getting ready for morel cultivation?

I think this is my third flush from this bed this year! It's been dry, but I have watered a couple times and bam, another solid flush rolls in.

I've been out in the garden the last few days harvesting kale, squash, tomatoes, basil, chard and more!

What do your gardens look like!?!?

This North Sporian is the Head of Video Production and she has been absolutely critical to presenting our company and our mycological knowledge to the world. When she isn't climbing, surfing, kayaking, paddle boarding or backpacking, she is doing EVERYTHING it takes to produce excellent content. Short-form, long-form, ads, scripts, editing and even presenting on screen, Bre has stepped up to do it all.

I've seen this lady grow so much into this role, taking it into her own hands with her own plans. Her organization, conscientious approach and love of scientific education comes through everyday.

She's worked for NS for, idk, 5-6 years is it? So literally the majority of our video content has her fingerprints all over it. But here's what I think is the obvious piece to highlight: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEWmDgcM4FM

I'm going to take the time to make some posts about the incredible team members I have here at North Spore. It might give some insight into what we do, how we do it and that we're a diverse group of well-intentioned, intelligent humans just like all of you.

Taylor Wood came to us about 3 years ago through Breanna Penney (our Head of Video Production, I'll post on her next). They'd worked together in the past and we needed more help. In many ways, his job is similar to Bre's and they're constantly collaborating. He scripts videos, shoots them, takes photos, make ads, makes timelapses and more. The amount of time and effort this guy will take to get the things right is both maddening and inspiring at the same time. His official job title is Creative Asset Project Manager, but he's working on a better name that sums up his responsibilities.

I don't say this lightly: he has an incredible sense of humor and is ALWAYS bringing positivity to North Spore.

The primo technology and thoughtful angles Taylor employs even manages to make me look halfway decent (I'm the one with the chestnut mushrooms). His work is everywhere on the website, but this piece truly stands out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXkRHVWkbY8

These are so damn easy to grow, delicious and insanely cool looking. I'm on a mission to make sure the world knows about these. Let me know if you have questions!

Check them logs!

Yes, it took a year, but once you start making logs regularly, just like wine or cheese you start getting them regularly after that initial wait.

I'm pretty sure these logs came from a local arborist friend that was cutting the wood anyway!

Any questions about log cultivation? Who else has logs going?

Btw, now is a great time to start thinking about fall inoculations!

Read our guides: https://northspore.com/pages/outdoor-mushroom-growing-guides#logs

I led two Mushroom ID Walks (8/1 and 8/2) and even though it was crispy, we found quite a few great mushrooms to discuss. We had to go downhill and actually into creek beds to find the moisture. The couple pics I've shared are of An Ash Bolete (Boletinellus merulioides) and a Rooting Shank (Hymenopellis radicata). Both edible, but only the Hymenopellis is good.

My next walk is in Wells, ME on 8/15 at A beautful property called The Wells Reserve at Laudholm. I hope that if you're not too far away, you'll consider joining!

https://wellsreserve.org/.../mushroom-identification-walk

Today is my 4th wedding anniversary and to celebrate, we went on a trail run and....we got distracted.

We found some Chicken of the Woods (Laetiporus sulphureus) and a lesser known guy that I think is a Bicolor Bolete (Boroangia bicolor). I'll take a closer look later today, but if I'm right, its one of the most beautiful and delicious mushrooms we have in the NE US. There are some lookalikes I should rule out.

Chicken is a saprobe that grows on dead wood and the bolete is mycorrhizal. Chicken can be cultivated, but it quite difficult. Probably the best method involves taking a fresh cut hardwood log section, about 1' x 8", sticking it in an XL grow bag, sterilizing it in pot or pressure cooker and then inoculating it with COW sawdust spawn. Once closed up again, that bag will sit and colonize for a couple months. After full colonization, then it can be very shallowly or only partially buried outside. Multiple other difficult species (Like Hen of the Woods (Grifola frondosa)) benefit from this method as well.

I have also seen people get some small yields inside, but it's very uncertain and slow.

I'm excited to test another species in the same genus, Laetiporus cincinnatus, more thoroughly because it might end up working better with this method. The reason I think this is because it is usually found on buried wood vs. L. sulphureus which is more of a shelf.

If you wanna try L. Cincinnatus in the name of science please reach out and I'll hook you up with a discount on the culture.

https://northspore.com/products/chicken-of-the-woods-cultures?_pos=2&_sid=967ecc8d7&_ss=r&variant=31312227336294

I soaked my Shiitake logs 8 days ago, now I have a good size harvest! Such fun the last picture is from when I soaked them.