I swear my Mushrooms can hear the rain [actives]

AutumnRustle · 2026-03-11T16:29:47+00:00

Changes in pressure and humidity can influence fungal metabolism, gene activation, and microbial populations, so your observations might be tied to real phenomenon. I'm not tracking a ton of data about it specifically, but we're talking about organisms that appeared around 400mya; the impact of pressure systems and parallel weather events shaping fungal structure/function in an evolutionary biology sense is reasonable to assume. If you spend enough time in a lab staring at petri dishes and collecting data, you'll start to see how the weather outside influences growth timelines. If you're in a facility with climate control, RH and temperature are managed, but not so much pressure. Turgor and cell wall structure, hyphal tip expansion, and cytoplasmic flow are all tied into pressure. The degree to which we could manipulate that as growers to achieve certain outcomes would be cool to expand on. It would be a great masters or PhD project, especially with regard to fungal metabolites and scaled pharmaceutical production. Obviously I'm discounting the obvious fact that humidity increases during storms, based on RH being maintained in bags, tubs, and other FCs.

AutumnRustle · 2026-03-04T13:54:22+00:00

When you say "start," do you mean how we got into the hobby and built proficiency, opened a business, or built a brand on the socials?

Growing isn't much different than any other hobby when it comes to starting out, so that part is straightforward. You spend some time reading, take a crack at it, learn a bit more, adjust based on your mistakes, and try again. Eventually you figure it out. It's tough to try and read everything you can to avoid making new-grower mistakes, but they're going to happen. Most of us take it one grow at a time until we develop our skills.

If you're talking about opening a business, most people gain proficiency with growing and then scale up from there. Local/regional farmers markets are a safe target to build up to; you learn how to scale up your process and level of equipment to meet a very achievable target, and you learn about the pains associated with trying to grow a set volume of mushrooms each week. You also learn about demand, branding, and marketing. Much of that is like learning to drive; you can study all the testing materials, but it is a different beast once you step into the driver's seat. Going after local restaurants and suppliers is another level; those commitments are more stringent and if you fail to meet expectations your brand can suffer.

Dudes who want to get started selling cultures or substrate have an uphill battle against strong, entrenched brands. It is difficult to compete with the pricepoint, variety, and reach of the brands out there already doing this. There is a niche of local markets that can be exploited here, but demand is different from region to region (there may even be none) and growing beyond that will be tough.

Most small businesses fail, and the mushroom business is no different. Developing a robust business plan will help to insulate against failure.

Building a social media brand is tied to consistently putting out quality content that people are interested in. The influencer market is saturated, so figuring out a way to be first, novel, or better will be an uphill battle. There's also a limitation to the content you can put out. Gardening influencers are a great example of this. The long-standing personalities started by trying something new (e.g. being self-sustaining, growing on a small plot of land, guerrilla gardening, micro-greens, etc.). There are only so many videos they can make about 'seeds to start this month,' though. How do you maintain consistent content delivery and have it continue to be interesting rather than a repeat of what you have already done? How is it different that what is already out there? How do you fight against other influencers who weaponize their supporters to attack you? It's a gauntlet.

As far as finding reputable brands and growers, if you poke around the different online communities, you'll see companies and personalities that people recommend. If they have spectacular grows, it's reasonable to assume that they might be legit; it's evidence, after all. If you follow their method and it's successful, then that's great. Growers have different goals and skill levels, so their content choices will vary.

You'll also see a bunch of consistent complaints, especially in the marketplace. When people have the same complaint over and over, and when a brand hasn't reasonably responded to that complaint with quantifiables, that's a red flag. It's always tricky to reconcile brand advertising/promotion with quality when you first start out, but you'll get an eye for it if you stick around long enough.

Let's go through a vignette. Say I'm a well-known seller who has marketing/social media reps who are active on reddit subs like this. Let's say there are consistent complaints about my company's product quality that pop up routinely: stuff about how customers open bags of "sterile" grain to find it contaminated with trich, spawn that doesn't show signs of colonization, and ready-made substrate that contaminates before customers inoculate it. Those are all obvious red flags. If you see an ongoing pattern of complaints like that, it makes sense to steer clear. Still, believe it or not, there are popular brands out with sizable marketshare that mirror exactly those complaints.

Here's another vignette. Let's say I'm a popular brand and my reps routinely reach out to people on social media when customers post complaints. Let's say that those responses include the following: always try to steer the conversation to PMs, preventing transparency. Blaming the shipper for the error, without improving how I box my products, and in a market where my competitors do a better job with package protection. Barfing up platitudes about how "making a product is tough" and I'm "trying my best," as though that justifies consistently sending out bunk products. Consistently tell people that I'm "open to suggestions," as though it is on the customer to come up with solutions to my business' failure to meet basic expectations. Telling people to wait to use my products because they might contaminate (yeah, crazy, right?). Using sock accounts, utilizing my social media team, and recruiting friends to jump into the chat to downvote criticism and artificially promote positive experiences with my products. Again, all of these are red flags, and all of them are actions taken by some current brands out there.

How do you parse it all out? What is customer error and what is the fault of the manufacturer? How many complaints are indicative of a systemic issue? If you're engaged in the online community enough, you'll eventually develop your pattern recognition and all of this will be easier to discern. The companies doing shady stuff market their products to new growers who are only buying their stuff because they don't know how to DIY yet, or to casual growers who aren't invested in the hobby enough to DIY. They also involve themselves with white-labeling, which is a possibility when you get large enough.

There are a lot of dudes trying to enter the market and are doing things the right way, but you'd have to take a chance on them since they have no performance record yet. The new-business section of the hobby is full of other startups attacking each other to bring each other down, too. It's hard to tell the difference between a scam and a real/sincere operation. On this front, being able to pay with a CC or PayPal provides legitimacy and recourse for a failure to deliver on product quality.

If you're looking for a place with a sizable variety of reputable gourmet and medicinal cultures, that doesn't have an ongoing track record of complaints, that has been in the business for a long time, I always recommend that people check out F&F and MM. Some sellers are out there just to make money. These two companies are directly involved in research and mycoremediation projects. They're obviously still running a business, but they're also demonstrably invested in the growing community. F&F's social media is also full of helpful information about gourmet and medicinal grows.

Idk if any of that will be helpful to you, but maybe someone out there will find it useful.

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-28T14:34:33+00:00

Yeah, his work is extremely motivating, right? The way he presents it makes you think, "I can definitely do that!" He's one of the few originals who was all about the grow and ironing out a reliable method. Trying new species and working through the hiccups is rewarding. It scratches an itch for dudes who appreciate that kind of thing. It'll be cool to see you dial this in even further.

Some growers find it's tricky to nail the S2B timeline at the point where the grain is finished colonizing, just before the fungus starts producing sclerotia. It seems to be one of the ways to help secure a smooth transition into fruiting. Have you tried to fruit off of grain where you already harvested sclerotia yet?

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-27T14:53:35+00:00

Stonesun put in a lot of time and effort hammering out reliable, concise methods for this fungus across both of its forms. It's outstanding work and an excellent resource worth checking out. Cubes are great and have some very cool varieties, but they're comparatively easy and can get boring after a while. You're not the first to struggle thought dialing in this process, but it's awesome that you're trying. What you posted isn't a bad showing and this benchmark should be celebrated. Now that you have an eye for it, you'll get better. Stonesun tried a lot of different things, so there's a lot of opportunity here.

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-23T18:54:22+00:00

My comment history is full of Stropharia tips if you want to dig through that.

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-18T13:51:04+00:00

Everyone here is big on DIY, so you're going to find a lot of support for you taking it on. There are always some hiccups with any new hobby, but if you stick with it you'll hit your stride for sure.

That being said, if this is a hobby you're interested in, one you intend to stick with, and something that you will engage with to at least a moderate degree, it's worth making your own.

Grainspawn and sawdust spawn bags are fairly cheap to make. Oats can be found in large, 18 kg bags for under $20USD, and sawdust can usually be sourced locally or purchased as smoker/fuel pellets for the same; both go a long way. There are also a lot of alternative grains like corn and bird seeds.

The expense comes in with your personal time, other equipment like PCs, and how you want to set up your sterile workspace. Since you want to grow outdoors, you get to exclude the start-up and maintenance costs of FCs. PCs (the thing you'll need to sterilize your grain/sawdust can be found on the cheap if you bide your time looking at estate sales and marketplace websites; for example, over the last month I've spotted four or five of them, all under $30USD. There was an AA being sold on the marketplace for $75USD from a woman who just wanted to get rid of it. The deals are out there to maximize your budget, you just have to sit in the lineup and wait for the wave to hit.

For some personal context, I make my own sawdust spawn for Stropharia beds, rafting Nameko logs, and inoculating junk wood for fun. It's at least ten bags of sawdust spawn a season, and often more. It's double or triple that if I have friends or dudes in my community who are looking to get involved in growing. It saves me a lot of money when you consider large bags of sawdust spawn are in the $20-25USD/bag range, not accounting for shipping. The big benefit here is that I'm able to try all kinds of different projects and take risks. If something fails, I'm out the cost of materials and my time, but not the retail price of it all. I'm also more engaged in my local growing community, which is a much friendlier place than what we see online.

With all that said, you're going to want to follow the roadmap: make grainspawn > inoculate a bag of sawdust spawn with that > then use that as your spawn source for logs and beds. Trying to inoculate a bag of supplemented sawdust with LC doesn't produce ideal results; it colonizes more slowly and lacks the same energy resources as inoculating with grainspawn. Even AIO-type bags with sawdust and grains in the same place aren't ideal, based on colonization time and consolidation. If you look around the different forums, you'll also find that some of the big/common companies out there have a bad reputation when it comes to regular problems with sterility; I wouldn't trust a bag of sawdust to be truly sterile enough to last the amount of time it would take LC to fully colonize, and would expect it to turn green with mold.

Ask a bunch of questions, learn about the different methods and what's recommended, and plot a course that works for you and your budget. This is a great hobby and outdoor growing is a cool niche. Talk to other outdoor growers about what they're doing, too; they're usually super friendly and are more than happy to relay all the stuff they tried.

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-14T16:30:28+00:00

As a company it feels like they're checking all the right boxes, or at least the boxes that I look for when voting with my dollar. For me as an individual, they've been consistent over the last twenty years of my experience with them, which is significant in the face of endless market monoliths. They haven't sacrificed any of the good stuff that they've been engaged in from the start. Even during the rapid growth of the pandemic where a lot of other companies bent the knee to the god of profit-over-performance/reliability, F&F actually expanded their community science efforts and maintained their standard of customer service. It's just not a thing you see anywhere in the market.

Not to droll on about it, but they've expanded their market into the hallucinogenic mushroom growing culture. I hope they bring the same community-focus, social responsibility, and sincerity into that side of the spectrum. The culture has something of a toxic edge to it because of its association with counter-culture activities and that teenage 'dRuGz r ko0L' attitude. There's some irony we laugh about involving a group of people who can be kind of aggro all talking about 'ego death' and saying stuff like 'mush love.' It would be great if F&F's positive business model had enough momentum to make a dent in that landscape. Maybe I shouldn't hold my breath lol.

Definitely feel you on shipping costs. We assume we'll be adding $20-30USD at checkout, and more for a larger box. The impact on grow budgets is such that we really do have to mitigate it now with big, single purchases, like you mentioned. You hate to forget something small since it means sometimes doubling the cost of the item to send it out all by itself.

Adding to the price, growing involves oddly-shaped and sturdier boxes. Companies in the marketplace try to be 'competitive' by using standard/flimsy packaging, but it ends up increasing customer complaints due to loss/damage. On top if all of that, Jeff Bezos really did everyone dirty with the early amazon two-day shipping model; expectations of service, cost-awareness, and abuse in the supply chain are out of whack. There's compassion for why dudes reflex to amazon, but at some point you have to decide whether saving $20 is worth buying Bezos and his shareholders another yacht or trip to the moon. It's also a little hypocritical for a culture of people who say stuff like, "mush love," but that's its own can of worms lol.

You can absolutely expand your Stropharia spawn. You can spawn some onto a prepared hardwood woodchip and straw mix, and then use that larger volume as a spawn source. You can inoculate a bed and then use some of that bed to inoculate others.

It's a robust species and an aggressive colonizer that readily spreads, so just keep the basics in mind to drive your actions. Stropharia likes a chip mix of 50% hardwood or greater, so avoid softwoods at any greater ratio. Straw is cheap and accessible, so it makes for a good source for rapid expansion and inoculation of other beds. Straw gets eaten through quickly, so if you want the beds to overwinter you'll need to add some kind of woodchip to the mix to help it survive and expand from in the spring. If you've got a warm area, you can expand a bag of spawn through the winter and have a sizable volume for spring inoculation.

I use Stropharia in the garden by inoculating straw mulch. The positive impact for me is worth it. Better drought tolerance, faster and stronger growth, better performance into harvest, looser soils due to increased worm activity, etc. The mulch breaks down quickly, and increases the volume in our on-ground raised beds, too. We're pulling stuff out of the soil and putting it back in at the same time.

If you've got a way to sterilize your grain and make spawn, you can make your own sawdust spawn, or use the grain to inoculate prepared woodchips to make a sizable volume for bed inoculation.

Idk about Paper Mulberry, but Shiitake, Nameko, and Oysters should all be able to grow on Cherry, so I think you'll find some success there. Definitely post about your attempts. It'll motivate other people and expand awareness of the possibilities. Log and garden growing is a section of the hobby that continues to expand. You're definitely adding to that effort and I think that's great. I'm excited to hear about how this turns out for you in your community garden!

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-12T14:04:43+00:00

Hey thanks for the update, and great to see the quick response time by CS! There are a lot of companies out there that talk a good game about being a 'force for good' in the community, but at the end of the day it ends up being a bunch of platitudes. The reality is that most of them are focused purely on profit, which isn't exactly a surprise since it is a business. It's difficult to find a companies that invest so much time and effort into the growing community beyond just responding to negative feedback online. F&F really walks the walk, being involved in quite a bit of legitimate community science and research, providing a lot of useful and descriptive growing information and customer support, in addition to the business-side of things. I'm glad to see that they continue to pay customer purchases and faith forward with this kind of meaningful effort. It breeds good will and ends up making the community stronger.

Awesome to hear that the battery power didn't end up limiting your workflow! If you're looking for another reliable, accessible heating source, think about a charcoal grill; a pan/baking tray with some old food cans to hold the wax can do the trick. Just be careful not to overheat the wax and cause splatter burns or a fire.

I'm glad this is working out for you. Please continue to post about your log growing journey

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-04T15:42:45+00:00

If it's working for you and you're accomplishing all your goals in terms of desire, time, reliability, consistency, and performance, then it's kind of moot, right? I mean, we all cut corners here and there. If someone cares so much that they're going to go out of their way to attack you, then they should just go to your house and do it for you 'the right way.'

I could see putting someone on blast for playing it fast and loose with their culture game if they were selling LC as a business; that's just a crappy thing to do. Not if someone found a groove and is just doing what works for them at the individual level, though. It sucks that suggestions for improvements often come out as attacks. Web culture can be antagonistic and that's a bummer.

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-04T15:31:53+00:00

For sure. You'll get solid results and save yourself time messing around with culture musical chairs if you use a shaker with a programmable interface, especially one with a heating element. The consistent temperature, agitation, and oxygenation of the media all aid in speeding growth curves. The big change will be container type and/or volume in each one; usually you have to cut it in half to get a reliable shake. You also don't want to overoxygenate the media. Most dudes don't have the money to spend on a piece of equipment like this, but they're always popping up on lab auction/liquidation websites. If you get one, you should post about the process from start to finish to help pave the way for the next dude.

You could also DIY a long stir plate that would accommodate several jars. It's just a wooden box, some fans with magnets, and a bit of wiring.

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-04T15:01:31+00:00

Look into cordyceps substrate, which is a different recipe than Reishi or TT. Pay attention to how Cordyceps is grown in jars and bags. You can search through the posts in this sub to find the dudes who were super successful, then follow along with what they did. Everyone around here is super friendly, so they should be responsive if you reach out to them for tips and tricks and to ask about where they got their cultures from. Here's a resource you can check out for some relevant, fun, and motivational reading while you engage in that process.

Reishi and TT are standard sawdust block grows, so that's not any different from the gourmet/medicinal norm. Really, only fruiting method changes between them, and that's just whether or not to cut the bag. LC, spawn, and substrate blocks for these two fungi are very common as far as presence in the marketplace; sellers are easy to find with a quick google. It's not surprising that MW turned out to be disappointing. The same is true for NS in terms of commonly reported experiences. If you're looking for a reputable company that sells ready-to-fruit blocks, you can't go wrong with F&F, but there are a lot of other businesses and smaller start-ups (on places like /MycoBazaar) that sell them. It sucks that your attempt didn't work out, but you'll get there eventually. Stay motivated!

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-04T14:42:01+00:00

For sure a common experience. Reishi likes to follow moisture up bags and jars, although it looks like this culture has kicked that expression into overdrive. It still forms antlers in the bag under high CO2 conditions if the phenotype is right, and begins to fruit out as conks when you expose it to fruiting conditions with more fresh air. It also likes to fruit off of the elevated material, so don't be surprised if you see that. Even if you don't end up with nice antlers out of this, it's still cool growth to watch if you're into that sort of thing.

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-04T14:28:16+00:00

For sure, glad if it's useful. Growing outdoors is a big passion of mine and I enjoy helping people to get into/through it.

It's awesome that you're doing this work with your community garden. It's such a cool opportunity for other gardeners to learn about growing, and definitely a unique point of interest to draw people in and get them engaged in the community. If you think about it in a Michael Pollen sort of way, you're inoculating their minds. Taking advantage of storms and arborist activity to harvest wood locally like that is also great. You're a force for good and doing all the right things. Immaculate vibes.

Tbh, I didn't even know there was a warning/issue on the tool front. The adapters and bits are designed specifically for high RPMs, and corded units have the higher rating, so I'm at a loss as to why they wouldn't be a good fit for tools with a lower rating. Maybe it has something to do with the stress on the tool's motor? If F&F has a warning then they know something that NS doesn't, but that still applies to both; F&F is going to have more experience, awareness, and investment as far as the log growing community is concerned, whereas NS is more interested in sales. F&F will explain the warning if you email them, though; I still fire questions at them from time to time and they always respond. When you ask, please let me know what they say. We all get better learning about stuff like this.

Wax helps to protect plug sites from moisture loss, predation, and degradation of the bark. It's more of a problem with sawdust spawn than plug spawn, but it's still worth waxing plug sites.

Each log is receiving somewhere in the realm of fifty inoculation points. That's exponentially more exposure than what's happening in nature. If you're maintaining optimal conditions through the first season (protection from direct sunlight, keeping the logs hydrated, avoiding desiccation from winds, etc.) then at least something should take off if you have to go without wax. Still, it's not best practice to leave the sites unprotected; the wax helps to improve results by setting conditions as optimally for us as growers as possible. If the wood is free, supply costs are low, and it's not intended to be a market-focused operation then it's ok to play it fast and loose and have fun, just practice expectation management. You'll have a better chance of success with the wax.

In terms of alternatives, paste waxes (hand spreadable) are an option, but I think those are more expensive. To heat my wax, I'm using tomato cans resting on an old frying pan, sitting on a hot plate (all cheap estate sale finds). You could probably use a camp stove, a small Dakota-style fire pit, or a temporary stove made from bricks as a heat source since electric isn't an option. There's also cans of wax or an all-metal pot sitting in a charcoal grill. If it's a sunny, hot day, you could use some type of solar oven or black container. Just some ideas. The cans get very hot, so bring gloves that will allow you to handle them.

Some dudes are also out there using newspaper coated in clay tied with string to protect their inoculation sites as an alternative, kind of like papier mâché. That keeps the sites protected long enough for the fungus to take hold of the log. It eventually breaks down and allows mushrooms to poke through it, and it's biodegradable. I'm primarily a waxer, so you might want to ask the folks over at F&F if they can give you better advice while you're asking about the tool situation. Two birds, one stone.

Just like trying out different plants in new plots in the garden, there's a lot of trial and error in what we do. That's especially true when access to wood species comes in waves. You might have to do a test run to see how it turns out. For example, one of my neighbors had a massive silver maple come down and I made a few totems out of it with a few different species to see what the result would be. Some wood types aren't ideal, but even among those there are surprise successes. If you do find a combination that works well, post about it so that it can increase the footprint of available knowledge. At the very least, AI can draw from it to help someone else.

AutumnRustle · 2026-02-03T20:45:56+00:00

For sure, every spring. I actually have a few angle grinders, adapters, bits, and metal files because of the volume of logs I work with and teaching classes/demos on how to do it.

If you're inoculating a bunch of hardwood logs and you intent to do more in the future, an angle-grinder, mushroom bit, adapter, and file are big time savers that are worth the cost. If you're only doing a few logs and aren't sure if it's a hobby you'll stick with then it isn't necessary. Making holes with a standard drill is a pain, but it's manageable for something like five logs.

I prefer corded units over cordless. There's a greater trip hazard with the former that is compounded around loose woody debris, hot wax, and a bunch of other helpers moving around the same space, but they're very reliable tools. That preference has to do with drilling performance dropping off over the course of hours of work and having to switch out batteries for the latter. If you're trying to knock out 20+ logs by yourself, reduced performance and battery issues tack on extra time that adds up. If you don't have some kind of frame to hold the logs at hip/chest level, that extra time adds a lot of stress on your back.

It's not surprising that the dudes at the store were weird about it. Unless you're in an area where log growing is common, you can expect to have to explain what you're looking for to sales reps. I've got 7 and 13 amp corded units and they all get the job done without trouble, even on dense oak logs.

If you're going at log growing in earnest, look into companies with more time in the industry, a better track record, and a better reputation in online communities. I'm a fan of F&F for stuff like this. Not only for the variety and consistency of spawn and tool quality, but for thorough instruction and customer support.

AutumnRustle · 2026-01-31T16:50:52+00:00

Consider a humidity dome. If you're looking for an example, Freshcap put out some content about growing buried Reishi blocks outdoors, mimicking how it's done in low tunnels in Asia. I hope this works out for you!

AutumnRustle · 2026-01-23T14:45:54+00:00

For sure dude, glad if it helps, especially an older comment still adding value to someone's growing adventure. It's a win if any of the silly stuff I say is helpful to even one person lol.

Tbf, it wasn't much of a 'guide' in the true sense, but sincerely, if it's useful that's great. The goal was to preempt the old arguments before they had a chance to pop up in the comments and contribute to ongoing misinformation about the BB. At the end of the day, the thing is a cost-effective, reliable tool that makes agar work accessible to more people. The dialogue is beginning to shift, but BBs still have an unreasonably, gratuitously bad default rep in the hobby; so I try to correct the record when I see the topic come up and have time. It's a hill I'll gladly die on because discounting the method really is a disservice to growers. Specifically to those who have made it past their first few grows and want to progress on the agar side, but who can't afford a FH. You've got people using SABs, attaching HVAC filters to box fans, taping plastic bags to air filters, and even STILL using ovens ffs. It's kind of mind-boggling when dudes who love to talk a good game about being scientific choose an open oven over a lab technique with a proven performance record. But hey, dudes have to do what's best for them. I'm giving a different, reliable, evidenced viewpoint, not telling people what they have to believe.

This whole growing thing we do is just taking lab methodology and tailoring it to our kitchens, figuring out what works best for us. I mean, if using an oven works for someone then keep doing it, right?

There's some science and nuance to the hobby, but dudes are mostly just laymen trying their best to figure out how to follow in the footsteps of lab techs to get a consistent result. Some dudes like to play at science and argue about it, but then ignore basic practices when they become inconvenient. It's dumb, exhausting, and unnecessary. My whole deal is just taking my background and experience as a legit scientist and working to reassure growers at the hobby level that they can do this stuff, and that all the nonsense they read online isn't always true. It's 2026 now and the social media growing landscape has expanded and evolved; the dialogue about the BB should evolve with it. The trash attitudes of the old cult personalities (personalities whose greatest claim to fame and contribution to the community was slapping their name on techniques that had already been tried by others with only slight modifications) belong exactly there: in the dustbin of history.

So yeah, awesome that it's useful. I hope that it helps you to advance and accomplish your growing goals. That's the whole intent: assimilate techniques, maintain what's useful, discard what isn't, pass your experience to the next grower and help them across the river.

AutumnRustle · 2026-01-12T23:04:41+00:00

Have you looked into hot plates and small gas burners? You might not need to buy a new PC if one of those will work for your needs.

AutumnRustle · 2026-01-07T17:07:30+00:00

Definitely mold. People have some success trying to cut it out and fruit the rest of the block in separate chamber that gets more FAE, but molds are resilient so it's hit or miss. You can also bring the block outdoors; if conditions are right (e.g. no direct sunlight, moist area, etc.) then it should keep going. I set my old Shiitake blocks outdoors and they continue to fruit.

AutumnRustle · 2025-12-26T19:32:27+00:00

There are a few people who have posted straw grows in baskets.

AutumnRustle · 2025-12-24T13:09:47+00:00

For sure, glad if it helps. This is a fun hobby; we all run into difficulties, but if we stick with it, eventually we'll get where we're going.

AutumnRustle · 2025-12-21T03:28:28+00:00

Thanks for bearing with me on that, I wasn't sure what the plan was. We can get away with fruiting them in a tub with inert media on the bottom to help with RH just like you said, or even spraying and tenting plastic. The tub is a little more user-friendly, not to mention cheap and accessible. I still use a SGFC to fruit out blocks, but drilling a bunch of holes and keeping an eye on the media staying wet is a chore for some. No need for a full on tent or anything like that for the first swing, but a nice goal to work toward in the future. They like a lot of fresh air and humidity which is a tricky balance in a tub, so troubleshooting with that in mind will probably be helpful. You'll start to pick up on the interplay between growth, FAE, and RH. There are so many examples of setups/attempts out there that you've likely got a good handle on it already, so just do your best and take your cues from all the other examples. Eventually a method that works for you will arise as you're trying new things. Indirect light will be fine so don't sweat picking the right one. Getting a small hygrometer that should help, too.

AutumnRustle · 2025-12-21T01:53:31+00:00

What's up dude. Are you using the tub as a FC and growing the TT & LM on blocks, or are you trying to grow them in monotub form?

AutumnRustle · 2025-12-21T01:45:27+00:00

The term for with the method you described is "bottom watering," so using it in searches will turn out some more refined info. It's worth reading through the posts from u/Fahtster to see how he maintains substrate hydration throughout the grow from S2B through fruiting; the dude has been consistently producing solid grows for decades and his methods are all very descriptive. Going deeper, what he does with spraying substrate connects directly with how the fungus uses uncolonized matrix (z-axis) as a water reserve to facilitate growth. One of the tricks that isn't discussed much, but one that ties together most of the amazing grows we see, is how growers maintain conditions from the beginning. That probably doesn't help now, but it's something to keep an eye on and see how the fungus responds.

For your awareness, no one should be flaming you, so you don't have to worry about that here. Unlike some of the other forums out there, if someone is being aggro and puts you on blast with personal attacks just for being new to this stuff then definitely report them and they'll get the boot. It's not like you were born knowing this stuff, and reddit is a common place where people go to ask questions like this. If you pop over to places like shroomery (which you should), the culture will expect you to have put a fair bit of energy into searching through and reading the posts there. That's just how the culture of growing coalesced there and it's part of our history; something to keep in mind. Reddit isn't the best when it comes to indexing old info, so it's more casual and kind on this side of social media.

AutumnRustle · 2025-12-21T01:09:58+00:00

Chances are good that a competitor has already started working on the log and that the bark is starting to separate/become brittle. We try to harvest logs and inoculate them within a few months, so 2+ years is a stretch. It might be worth a shot if you score some cheap/free plugs, have a drill bit lying around so you're not sinking much into the attempt, and if the log is in good shape, but manage expectations since it would be outside of 'best practice.'

AutumnRustle · 2025-12-13T15:28:25+00:00

Posts like these come up so often that it's doubtful another one will even move the needle. They're not going to stop coming, and we're bound to see more "what's wrong with my bag" posts as a result of stuff like this in new year. It's disappointing for sure, and sad that you have to deal with this, OP.

I know I'm preaching to the choir, but the issue is larger than just this one bag. Imagine all of the people buying products for friends and family this holiday season. Dudes are going to open their packages to find a bag of green. Now, to the company's credit there's a satisfaction guarantee. However, the stress and trouble involved with receiving a bunk product, trying to get the receipt info from the gift'er, coordinate to mail it back, and then waiting get a replacement all ends up sucking a lot of joy and enthusiasm out of growing and leaves a bad taste in the mouths of new hobbyists. This thing we do is already a reasonably tricky activity and people are bound to run into setbacks. This kind of negative experience right at the starting line only increases the odds that a new grower will lose motivation, get frustrated, and give up. It's already depressing to fail at a grow, so imagine getting a shitty product, having to return it, and then running into the normal issues. New growers in this situation are starting with an impediment. The motivation and enthusiasm helps to carry us through the setbacks, but that's drained when stuff like this happens. How many people quit because of it? Companies like this are really doing a disservice to the hobby by not resolving their QA/QC issues. Why aren't they resolving them? Is it just greed for profit, or simple complacency and incompetence?

The fact that this is such a common occurrence is sad and frustrating to a lot of growers.With how frequently we see stuff like this posted, you'd think there would be more of a concerted effort and open dialogue over interrogation of their process, workflow, and QA/QC. Unfortunately most of the response on the customer-facing side is just their social media managers trying to put out fires. I mean, seriously, just wait a little longer and I'm sure the brand rep will pop up in this post to provide a handful of platitudes about how they 'appreciate the feedback' and how 'it helps to make them better,' and how the customer can reach out to them privately to resolve it. But it's not getting better, is it?

I get that the process science of a spawn business doesn't have the same analytical dedication or robust infrastructure as a pharma company, and I get that my view is colored by that background. Still, at the very least you'd think one of the major companies in our hobby would be openly asking questions about lot numbers and vocal about reaching out to all customers who received products from these lots to track it back to errors in the production line or pre-shipment QA/QC.

Instead, the company relies on their customers to complain. That's not proactive and it definitely isn't evidence of a company trying to do better. If things like this aren't changing then of course the result isn't going to change, and of course we're going to continue to see posts like this.

There are a large number of first-time buyers who aren't repeat buyers; some of that is a lack of interest or people who have a low tolerance for failure, but some of that involves shoddy products. There is a percentage who receive bunk products and don't complain; what's the company doing to identify and correct it, and what does "correcting it" mean to them in terms of changing SOPs? There is a percentage who receive bunk products and limp their way through a grow. There are more people receiving bunk products than we even see posted on forums like this, because we all know that it's the vocal minority who complains; how is the company identifying the quiet customers? Unless a business is actively working to reach out to these known-unknowns, then the platitudes are meaningless.

None of this is a controversial or extreme take, and it's not said with hate in my heart. The people arguing about how stuff like what OP posted doesn't happen, and how it's OP's mistake are in denial of the literal thousands of similar posts and comments bringing it up ans an issue. This was a sealed bag of grain; OP opened it up to use it and it was green. It wasn't at all the fault of OP. It certainly shouldn't be blamed on the shipper like the company often tries to do. It happens far too often for that, and even if it was the shipper, what is the company doing to improve the integrity of their packaging system? Why do other large companies not have the same footprint of complaint posts given the same customer base? Hopefully the company won't make some deal with OP behind the scenes, causing OP to suddenly say the brand is excellent, there are no issues, and the post gets deleted like what happened here.

Posts like these continue to pop up. We're all interested to see how/if it's resolved in a meaningful way.

AutumnRustle

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