Champignons today have become the kind of mushroom that is available for growing at home. The time between planting the mycelium in the substrate and obtaining the first fruits is minimal. No special conditions are required for mushroom cultivation. It is enough just to provide a cool room with high air humidity. A basement or cellar is fine.
Champignons can be grown both for personal use and for sale. But it is important to know that the substrate for their growth when wet exudes a rather strong odor. It is not advisable to keep it in a residential area.
Where and on what do mushrooms grow?
The very first and most important step in the successful cultivation of mushrooms is the correct preparation of the substrate. It must be prepared with high quality in compliance with all stages.
The mushroom substrate consists of:
- 25% compost (wheat and rye straw)
- 75% horse manure
There is experience in growing champignons based on chicken manure or cow dung, but you should not expect a high yield in this case.
The substrate is prepared in an open space on the street or in a well-ventilated room, since ammonia, carbon dioxide and moisture will be released during its fermentation. Additional additives per 100 kg of substrate are:
- 2 kg of urea
- 2 kg superphosphate
- 5 kg of chalk
- 8 kg of plaster
As a result, we get almost 300 kg of the finished substrate. With such a mass, you can fill a mycelium with an area of 3 square meters. m.
If a decision is made to prepare compost based on chicken manure, then the proportions will be as follows:
- 100 kg of straw
- 100 kg of litter
- 300 l of water
- Gypsum
- Alabaster
The procedure for preparing the substrate is as follows.
- Straw is soaked in a large, spacious container.
- The straw is laid in alternating layers with manure. There should be 3 layers of straw and 3 layers of manure.
- Straw in the process of laying in layers is moistened with water. Three layers of straw (100 kg) will take about 300 liters.
- During the laying of the layers, urea (2 kg) and superphosphate (0.5 kg) are gradually added in small portions.
- Mix thoroughly.
- Add chalk and the remainder of superphosphate, gypsum.
The resulting substrate is left to undergo a decay process. In this case, the temperature in the mixture will rise to 70 degrees. After 21 days, the compost will be completely ready for further use.
Planting material
When purchasing planting material, you should not save. Therefore, they acquire only the highest quality mycelium (mycelium). It must be grown under special laboratory conditions. Today mycelium producers present two types of planting material:
- Compost mycelium
- Grain mycelium
Grain mycelium is produced in plastic bags. Store it for about 6 months at a temperature of 0 to 4 degrees. Grain mycelium is used at the rate of 0.4 kg per 100 kg of substrate (mycelium area is 1 sq. M).
Compost mycelium is sold in glass containers. Its shelf life depends on the temperature.At zero degrees, it can last for about a year, but if the temperature is at 20 degrees, then the mycelium must be used within 3 weeks. Compost mycelium is used at the rate of 0.5 kg per 1 square meter of substrate. Its yield is much lower than that of grain.
A properly prepared substrate will surely spring when pressed. Before placing the mycelium into it, it must undergo a pasteurization (heat treatment) process. After heating, the substrate cools down to 25 degrees. A mycelium of 1 square meter is laid with about 100 kg of substrate with a layer of about 30 cm.
Planting mycelium and caring for mycelium
They take a piece of mycelium the size of a chicken egg and put it into the substrate by about 5 cm. Each portion of mycelium is placed at a distance of 20 cm from each other. A staggered arrangement is used for landing.
Another method involves uniform distribution (dusting) of the entire surface of the substrate with mycelium. You also need to deepen by no more than 5 cm.
Further actions are to provide the necessary conditions for the engraftment and germination of the mycelium. Air humidity should be kept at around 90%. The substrate must also be kept moist at all times. To prevent it from drying out, the myceliums can be covered with sheets of paper. Watering the substrate is carried out through the paper. An important condition for mycelium engraftment is a constantly maintained substrate temperature at a level of 22 to 27 degrees. Any temperature deviations from the norm must be adjusted immediately.
The germination time of the mycelium is approximately 7 to 14 days. After this period, the substrate needs to be sprinkled with a casing layer of soil about 3 cm. It is prepared independently from one part of sand and nine parts of peat. About 50 kg of casing layer will be consumed per square meter of mycelium.
The covering layer is kept on the substrate for three days, then the air temperature in the basement or cellar is reduced to 15-17 degrees. The cover soil is moistened with a spray bottle, and the room is constantly ventilated. Drafts are not allowed.
Harvesting
The process of self-cultivation of champignons in a cellar or basement is not too complicated and time-consuming. The period from planting to harvesting the first crop is 120 days. Only those mushrooms in which the plates under the cap are not yet visible are suitable for eating. Those mushrooms that are large are overripe, and dark brown plastics are forbidden to be used for food. They can cause poisoning.
The mushroom must not be cut, but carefully plucked with a twisting motion. The resulting depression is sprinkled with a covering substrate and moistened.
The mycelium will bear fruit for about 2 weeks. The number of crops harvested during this period is 7. Up to 14 kg of crop is harvested from one square of the area.
Growing mushrooms in bags
To grow champignons in large volumes for sale through retail chains, I use polymer bags. This method has received its recognition in many countries. With its help, a large harvest is obtained.
- For the manufacture of the bag, a polymer film is used. The capacity of each bag varies from 25 to 35 kg.
- The bags should be of just such a volume so that it is convenient to work with them. In addition, the correct arrangement of the bags affects the number of mushrooms grown. Usually they are arranged in a checkerboard or parallel order.
- So when installing bags with a diameter of about 0.4 m in a staggered arrangement, only 10% of the usable area will be lost, while their arbitrary installation gives losses of up to 20%.
- The height and width of the bags may vary. You need to proceed from their conditions and convenience of work, as well as the physical capabilities of the basement (cellar).
The method of growing mushrooms in bags is less costly, since they do not require specially mounted shelves or containers to place them.If it becomes necessary to use the area of the room as efficiently as possible, then a multi-tiered system can be created for the location of the bags. The advantage of this method also lies in the speed of dealing with emerging diseases or pests. The infected bag can be easily removed from healthy neighbors and destroyed, while if the mycelium is infected, it will be necessary to remove its entire area entirely.
It is important to remember that growing mushrooms is a rather laborious process. If champignons are grown for sale, then it is impossible to do without the use of agricultural machinery to facilitate the work of the workers.
Experienced mushroom pickers can list a large number of methods they have tested for growing mushrooms on their own in a basement (cellar). Each method has its own advantages and disadvantages. The main thing is adherence to the cultivation technology, strict adherence to all instructions and requirements. The result is the achievement of the desired result and obtaining a rich harvest of mushrooms.
