The basics of mushroom cultivation

Many people don’t realize that mushroom cultivation is something that can be done right in their own greenhouse. And since mushrooms are such a wonderful food, this can be a superb addition to one’s diet. However, you may need to change things about in your greenhouse if you want to grow mushrooms, because the one thing these edible fungi cannot stand is too much light. Yes, they can tolerate a little light, but perhaps I should modify that statement and say that they can tolerate a VERY little light.

Better than even a little light is no light at all. They also like a stable temperature range, so make sure that stays within the range of between fifty and sixty degrees Fahrenheit – anything more than that will cause problems for your mushrooms. You need to be careful to keep out any droughts. The air needs to be moist, because that’s just how mushrooms like it. If you’ve looked at any mushrooms growing in the woods, you’ll have noticed that they don’t exactly grow in the soil. Similarly, when you grow them in your greenhouse, or even in a garden shed, you’re going to have to arrange (or buy) a special growing medium for them.

There are two ways of going about mushroom cultivation, and the method that you choose will depend upon just how many of these fungi you plan to grow. If you’re starting out on the very smallest scale, a log of wood should do just fine for a cultivating medium. Yes, that’s absolutely right, you can grow mushrooms on a log of wood. And why should that surprise you – haven’t you seen them growing around tree stumps in the woods? All you need is a good log of some reasonably hard type of wood – oak does just fine.

Take that log and make a few reasonable holes in it, and fill each of them with some mushroom spawn. Then let nature take its course. If, on the other hand, you intend to grow mushrooms on a larger scale, you’re going to need to bed them down in trays filled with a special mushroom cultivating medium. Well, I did tell you before that they won’t grow in soil. What you’re going to need is some compost mixed up with straw or a mixture of straw and horse manure. You can plant the mushroom spawn in this, and your mushrooms will grow just fine. If you need to grow more mushrooms, you’ll just have to set out more trays and set aside more space for your mushroom cultivating.

If you want an easy start for mushroom cultivation click here