grain moisture content?

[altenate]

Hey all

Just wondering what peoples thoughts are on how much water to add to a spawn jar with wheat seed?

Seed was soaked for 24 hrs then sterilised in a PC.

I tried a few ways but one or 2 batches dried out too much after sterilising, adding cultures etc & one or 2 went a little soggy.

got some gluggy grain & some dry grains

yet some with the same water content are doing ok....

[OPP]

What do you mean by how much water should you add to the jar? Are you talking about innoculating or how much water to add to a jar full of dry seeds? I'm confused.

Did you rinse the wheat before and after soaking? If not, you should.

You should let the seed drain before loading into the jars.

You could try dumping all the seed into a towel, spreading it out and rolling the towel up to remove extra water.

How long did you PC for?

If you are inoculating from a spore print even 1ml of water can become a puddle on the bottom of the jar if the grains are wet.

Edited November 3, 2011 by OPP

[El Presidente Hillbillios]

yeah the trick is to get moisture inside the grain, not so much outside.

I soak overnight, rinse,then simmer gentle for about half an hour. Checking grains by pinching them in half with my thumb nail. Rinse again. Then let em drain overnight.

[altenate]

Can see the confusion OPP.

And thanks hillbillios

I have had good success previously.

Think it may have been pc time and not water content.

I ended up carrying pc to hood and water may have entered the jars....it was a bit of a distance and a couple of stairs....pc d for 45 mins or so in this case. Grain was soaked and rinsed and drained before sterilizing.

I might have been a little lax in covering jars in pc. Hence the dryish grain, wet from movement.

You guys adding gypsum? Or anything else to grains? Curious on people's teks

[migraineur]

Do you cover your jars with foil when you put them in the pressure cooker? This stops water from entering the jars during sterilisation. If you have filled your pressure cooker up quite high then the water enter your jars too, especially if you've moving it around whilst walking up/down stairs etc.

Also, if you simmer your grain for 10 mins or so after soaking it then once you strain it you will notice that the grain 'steam dries' to some extent which speeds up the process.

I add gypsum when soaking grain because it stops the grain from sticking together. Don't rinse your grain after soaking it in gypsum otherwise it defeats the purpose of doing it in the first place.

Using it can also give you a bigger harvest but you'll have to mix it in your substrate too. Putting a little in your pot of soaking grain is different to adding it to your bulk substrate.

[Mycot]

All in all I find working with most grains troublesome to work with for a good number of different reasons.

I'm rarely happy with the results and I'm not making things easy for myself. I swapped over to working with popcorn some time ago and have never looked back. Less problems with collonization and heaps easier to shake.

Working with other grains is practically obsolete in my book these days.

Do yourself a favor and use a popcorn tek, you won't regret it.

Edited November 4, 2011 by Mycot

[El Presidente Hillbillios]

do you mean actually popped pop corn? Sorry i dont get out much.

How do you do it? whats your tek?

[OPP]

I ended up carrying pc to hood and water may have entered the jars....it was a bit of a distance and a couple of stairs....pc d for 45 mins or so in this case. Grain was soaked and rinsed and drained before sterilizing.

I might have been a little lax in covering jars in pc. Hence the dryish grain, wet from movement.

 

How much water is in your PC? There should only be 2cm or less. It sounds like you have far too much water in your PC if the water is sloshing around. If the PC is at the correct temperature the weight on top should only hiss every couple of seconds. The steam should barely be escaping. If the hiss is continuous then the PC is not keeping its pressure.

The general rule for PCing is 60 minutes after reaching the correct PSI.

Hillbilly - He means using popcorn kernals. Have a look at this http://www.shroomery.org/9035/Popcorn-Tek-w-pics

Edited November 4, 2011 by OPP

[migraineur]

I've had not problems with shaking my grain. Do you use gypsum? This helps prevent the grain sticking together. If your grain is too moist then it would be harder to shake too as it would become gluggy and stick together.

I used rye grain originally but when I couldn't get it I turned to wheat which is awesome because it's cheaper and easier to get. I'm guessing the bigger grain size of wheat would make it a little easier to shake too.

I've never used wild bird seed. I prefer to have a consistent grain size so the grain cooks evenly. I also wonder if wild bird seed would be a bit harder to break apart in the jars once colonised because of the smaller grain size.

[Distracted]

Roger rabbit teaches the toilet paper trick.

Put some dried toilet paper on the table, then scoop up a handful of grain and put it on the toilet paper. If any moisture transfers from the grain to the toilet paper the grain is too wet.

Some random bits of info...

It's better to have a slightly too dry spawn than a slightly too wet one, the drier the spawn the faster the colonization time, until the grain is too dry then it will stall.

Burning your grain isn't the worst thing in the world, as long as the grain can still be individually separated it can still be used as spawn. You're just growing mycelium with the grains, not mushrooms.

There are some older teks that teach you to put a cup of water into a quart of dried grains before pressure cooking and it's supposed to hydrate the grain but i haven't heard of anyone doing that for awhile.

[ENtiTY]

Pop corn is the go alright. Much easier to get the moisture level right than smaller sized grains also its widely available in supermarkets everywhere and its pretty cheap to boot. Might not suit all fungi species but its a good grain to start out with as its so much easier to work with than your smaller grains. Give it a go and see what you think.

[Distracted]

Oh I forgot the most important tek of all! The dick tek.

You should be putting your dick in every jar of grains, if any grains stick to your dick the grains are too wet and should be dried further.

[migraineur]

Hahahaha

[ENtiTY]

Do you also inoculate your jars that way distracted?

[Distracted]

Nah I have a friend with the appropriate equipment to eat a few pounds of the mushrooms I want to grow and then discharge through the self healing injection ports. I'd do it myself but i am thicker than a needle

[Poline]

Actually, I had the same problem - grain dried out or went soggy. And I decided to use a peice of facric instead of a jar. I just put wheat seeds on a wet fabric and then cover it with the same fabric, thus seeds get water and don't go soggy. I heard that some industries use special equipment such as grain moisture tester, but it is good for large companies, but for those who work with a little amount of seeds. And the mentioned above technique is good for this purpose.

[fungi1963]

weigh your grain sample then put it in your oven and bake the moisture out of it

then take your baked grain and weigh it again

subtract the dry grain weight from the wet grain weight

you can divide this amount with wet weight to determine the percentage of water that was lost

now you know the moisture content of your grain and can ad only the exact amount of additional water to the rest of your grains to dial in a perfect ending moisture content

that's basically what Ag. scientists do to make reports for grain farmers

wbs is just the same as any grain to break apart after fully colonised

[lindsay]

I have good success with wheat and have stuck with it. here my method.

to fill 4 1/2 gallon jars.

I use 2.75 cups of wheat.

wash the wheat clean and add good tbl spoon of gypsum and soak 24 hrs..

this partly hydrates the grain.

heat to simmer point (in the soak water, add more if needed). stir every few minutes to keep the heat even.

after 5 min simmering start checking the grain, by splitting one between thumb nail and finger. grains that

are not fully hydrated will still have dry flour inside. keep cooking till this just disappears or just before.

if your grains are uneven in size, cook till 95% have hydrated. you can see by looking at the grain, it has

a whiteness to it.

now you have full hydrated wheat. now the surface water needs to be removed drain into a sieve and while still

hot, flip over and over till no more steam comes off.

this is my perfect wheat spawn. no split grains, shakes up easy, colonizes well.

if you get the inside of the grain right and totally dry the outside you cant go wrong.

put foil over the top off the jars and check for cracks in the jars and all should be good.

wheat is what I do know, now what I don't know. while we are on the subject of grain moisture.

that is budgie mix, mainly millet. (hope I am not hijacking this thread) keeping this going on grain moisture.

the method I am trying first is soaking the bird mix 12hrs then spinning off the excess moisture in a washing

machine spinner in a mesh bag or spun around by arm in a fine mesh bag by arm to remove surface moisture,

then presser cooking. any other ideas on millet, please help.