People
often tell me how they tried to grow edible mushrooms from a kit and either
failed or the yield was disappointingly low. Other people tell me that growing edible mushrooms is extremely
difficult and you have to do their expensive courses to be able to even
have a chance to
succeed. Depending on the type of mushroom, and your climate, growing
edible mushrooms can be pretty simple.
Some types of edible mushrooms are simple to grow, others are complex. If you are a beginner I suggest starting with one of the simpler types.
I grew some oyster mushrooms on newspaper logs and some others just on damp cardboard. I recorded the days from inoculation to harvest
here and
here. It was remarkably simple and turned waste into food. It was actually heaps of fun. One thing I have noticed is that many beginners don't understand the words that people use when talking about mushrooms, so any advice they read tends not to make much sense.
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Oyster Mushroom |
Fungi
are
not plants and they are
not animals, treating them like either may
result in failure. I have read many places say that fungi are plants without chlorophyll, this is incorrect. Fungi are more similar to animals than they are to plants, even when growing them I think they tend to react more like animals.
When trying to understand the terms people use when describing fungi it is sometimes
useful to compare them to plants or animals. This is simply for comparison. Like any analogy you reach a point where the comparison doesn't quite work.
In order to successfully cultivate edible mushrooms there
are a few simple things and a few terms you need to understand. Here are some useful terms that will enable you to understand what people are trying to explain.