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Drildo

Bulk Substrate Dramas...

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This represents 6 months of nothing but failed trays:
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Without going into too much detail, I have a friend that has changed to this style of sistema airtight tupper ware containers as trays.
Hes tried verm/coir & Hpoo/Straw and combinations of both... Has an expensive 900mm wide professional flow hood, showers before hand then douses himself in iso propyl before handling anything.

Admittedly he was not using gloves and doing ALL his work bare hand - but now has many boxes of rubber disposable gloves (in case this is where he went wrong).
In the past he has used bare hands and had 100% success - but the style of tray was much more open, with a foil lid.

He purchased these trays, drilled holes in the lids and covered with micropore thinking it would be a more airtight contam barrier style of tray.
But literally not a single tray has colonized in this time, only one got green mold, everything else the spawn seemed scared of the substrate, wouldn't even jump off.
Other times the substrate sort of half colonizes then stalls out... There is nearly always a sour grape or sour apple smell to these failed trays.

Trays are spawned with usually 50% spawn.  We are both thinking maybe the substrate is getting suffocated.  He went for the clear trays so he could visually see the progression without having to open them, or guess (due to non clear tray) But potentially with these non clear trays he used initially, the every second day opening to view progress actually helped provide them with FAE resulting in success?

This sour grape/apple smell mentioned earlier, he noticed this smell early on even in the successful non clear trays, but with opening every second day the smell seemed to air out and eventually dissipate as the substrate was colonized. Then final product smelt mushroomy and healthy, after first smelling sour. (This was with the successful ones)

So whats going wrong here?
- no gloves, contaminates under finger nails?

- too deep substrate (100mm+?) with not enough FAE  'Suffocation' ?
- Using a PC sterilized metal cheese grater to grate the cakes - is this a bad idea, if you grate spawn too fine does it die or dry out?

^Other than these 3 possibilities we really have not much to work on here... VERY FRUSTRATING!
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Does anyone have any kind of tray they can recommend that has been successful in the past for them?
Would maybe those disposable oven bake foil trays be a better option, 1 time use kind of thing? - problem is you cant see the sides to see if anything is side pinning, or contaminating.

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Edited by Skellum

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^Not after a huge investment in a flow hood Glaukus  :(
I don't think outdoors works year round either...

He'll crack it, its just time...
I think smaller trays, with a less airtight lid, combined with the use of gloves when laying, will potentially see some better results for this bloke.

Maybe even putting the cakes into a ziplock bag and breaking apart by hand could be better than grating too?
Some say fine as hell spawn is good for more inoculation points, others prefer to disturb and damage the spawn as least as possible when breaking apart.

Its sooo fkn rewarding when you get it right, but its pretty demoralizing when its constant failure...

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I once went 9 months straight with contams. If it wasn't for the fast that I was able to get fruits outside from contaminate subs I wouldn't have had shit.

 

I tested the tap water that I was using and found out that it was 6.0pH. So I not only quit using it, but I also started raising the pH to 7.5.

Another thing I did is that I started pasteurizing my substrate for a minimum of 12 hours.

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I've got a PH testing kit, I should actually use it to test his water. We use a diluted seaweed solution, with tap water as the mixer. Sometimes bottled supermarket water too.
I've heard bottled supermarket water can be quite acidic to begin with though.

Wow... 12 hour pasteurization...
He pasteurizes in quart jars. Might take only 40 mins to come up to the right temp, then they're taken off the heat and they slowly rise to pasteurization temps, sit there for about an hour then drop.
From mixing, to being ready to use my pasteurized jars are only take like 5 hours. I thought initially it may be his pasteurization technique, but RogerRabbit videos basically pasteurize the same, as do a lot of other home mycologists.

Thx for the reply cue he'll keep chipping away at it till something goes right...


EDIT: Tissue clones, agar work, clone LC's, perfect spawn runs with 50+ jars at a time, zero contams.    <---   All this is effortless for him. Its just the laying of the trays that is FUCKING UP!

Edited by Skellum

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Could be heaps of things, but I don't think not wearing gloves is one of them.. 

 

What temp is the sub when your buddy opens jars?? 5 hours seems very soon, and i imagine quite hot stiill?? Opening hot jars can suck in contams I've read. What is you pasteurisation temp???

 

Are the Tupperware boxes in darkness? What temps? Any moving air?

Is the mycelium active?

If the myc isn't taking the substrate, I would guess either not enough fae, too wet, too dry, too composted or myc is stalled? 

 

Also, what size are the holes drilled @ in the lid? Larger holes with poly fill might be better?

 

Keep the thread updated, would love to see your pal succeed with the gourmet and medicinal mushrooms.

 

 

 

 

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^I will talk to him and update as things progress.

Holes in the lids are  3mm... maybe a dozen or so per lid... all covered with micropore tape.

Jars are slowly heated till they reach 130 Fahrenheit then removed from the heat. They take about another 10 mins to creep up to somewhere close to 180 Fahrenheit, where they sit at for about an hour before gradually cooling. As soon as this hour of 180ish has completed, they are removed from the large pot, out of contact with warm water, and left on the bench to cool. 5 hours is an estimate, maybe its closer 7 hours sometimes. The temps are visually monitored and made sure they return to room temp e.g. same temp as they were at before they went into the pot to pasteurize.

Every jar is opened, and worked on in front of a 900mm wide flow hood - so temp I dont think is an issue, and if they ever were opened while warm potentially sucking contams in, they are opened in front of the flow hood, which will make it extremely hard, if not impossible to suck any free floating contams in, as they are all blown away. Its actually hard to cut up foil sheets in front of this flow hood whilst making prints as the flow is so strong the foil blows away.

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I'll suggest to him potentially making the holes bigger in the lids of the trays, hes also got tyvek filter disks that were cut up and used to make filter patches for jar lids.
Maybe he could use these same filter patches, glued over larger holes in the lids?

The Tupperware boxes are kept in darkness 2XB. No moving air. They are actually incubated at about 25 degrees, in a large 150litre tub-in-a-tub incubator.
We are thinking that ambient temps this time of the year will be too cold for proper colonization. But monthsss earlier when it was summer, again NO SUCCESS and they were incubated in a dark cupboard as ambient temps were right.

Mycellium at various stages of progress has been used, e.g. Jars that were only JUST 100% colonized a day or two before... other jars that were actually only 90% colonized... some jars that were colonized and consolodated too. Also jars that were colonized, consolodated & refrigerated for a fortnight before use.....   Many different stages of mycellium experimented with.   Also many different multispore mycellium has been used  ALONG  with tissue cloned isolated mycellium too.

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Tis' doing our heads in mate.....
There is about another 30+ jars of spawn ready to rock TONIGHT! too - so more trays will be laid very soon & hopefully something fucking colonizes.
I'll pass the suggestions on, and monitor his progress and report back here.


Thx for the reply benno, I appreciate you taking the time to offer some helpful suggestions.

Edited by Skellum

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Also tried laying the trays in layers like a lasagna for some, and thoroughly mixing everything through for others... Hasn't made a difference  :(

Two peeps have suggested larger holes for more gas exchange, this may be the issue.
We don't think its the bare hands either, but have gloves now to eliminate this potential.


Grrrrrr! :ana:

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I'd almost be willing to bet air exchange will solve it, 3mm is way too small IMO, try to drill all them out like 12mm ++ stuffed with polyfill, not too tight... I'm not sure of the consistency of tyvek filter disc, probs fine.

Also try to get coir/verm going so you can rule out any poo issues, ie  horse poo is a pretty variable thing, if you get coir dialed you know any further probs are poo related

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Very good info @2XB thank you.
That's the plan, he's only working with verm/coir now as we thought it was the hpoo causing issues.

Coming back to this hobby after a 6 year break - he attempted 3 initial large open non clear trays, with foil lids...
They were laid with hpoo and straw, fucking 100% success bout 9ish months ago, all done bare hand and open air with no flow hood. Even pot in a pot pasteurization as apposed to jars in a pot was used.

^lots of sub-par techniques and equipment and had perfect success, although the first run definitely would of had better air exchange...

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Hey this stuff I have here is called 'Filter Wool' and its made from 100% polyester:
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Is this the same as 'poly-fill'  -  I'm guessing it is?

Also here's a link to the filter disks hes got: http://www.aussimushroomsupplies.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=103&product_id=601
Just to give you an idea of what they are.

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18 hours ago, 2XB said:

too wet

^this^ Would be my next guess. I also started making my subs drier. Coir does a great job of retaining moisture, so it only has to be damp. IMO if when you squeeze your sub and any water comes out of it then its too wet.

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Thx cue

He trys to make the substrate mixes so that a few drops of water can be squeezed out. He was concerned on other runs that maybe the substrate was too dry, when barely any water could be squeezed out.
When mixing 50% spawn into the substrate surely the spawn sucks some water out too? - Maybe that's the issue though, freshly grated spawn getting sodden, from a wet substrate... hmm so many variables.

Will report results back here once I hear how he went on his next run.

Fingers crossed.

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I'm going to go for the long shot and say the airtight is the problem.

 

This is why I say so.

 

I have been making Jars for two years and only just have started having success and granted, moisture content and the kind of water does play a roll, i would like to think that because youve had a lack of spawning and even contam for that matter, nothing is getting air.

 

I used micropore tape before with very little success when its application was used soley as the ONLY FAE.

Micropore tape with, what I thought at the time was tyvek, didn't work

Only Polyfil has given me a solution to my growth stalls.

 

 Just try it, better than nothing and yeah, it's what I think the problem is

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On 12/06/2017 at 2:26 PM, 2XB said:

I'd almost be willing to bet air exchange will solve it, 3mm is way too small IMO, try to drill all them out like 12mm ++ stuffed with polyfill, not too tight... I'm not sure of the consistency of tyvek filter disc, probs fine.

Also try to get coir/verm going so you can rule out any poo issues, ie  horse poo is a pretty variable thing, if you get coir dialed you know any further probs are poo related

 

Even this dude got it

Edited by Psychotraits
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5 trays were apparently laid last night. The lids have about a dozen 3mm holes in each lid... He's opened up 5 of these dozen holes to about a 12mm diameter and filled with polyfill.
Had to use a jetlighter to melt them open... stepping up from 3mm to 12mm just shattered the plastic lol... even if he was to step up gradually 3,6,9,12 it still seemed as though it would of shattered, almost like tempered plastic, no give...

Another thing I was going to suggest to him is, you can actually pull the blue rubber seals out of these tupperware containers, maybe this would also provide extra & more even FAE?
Of course it will open it up to more contams, but it doesn't seem that contams are the issue. Hell hes even had major success in the past using FOIL lid covers over open style trays.
Its bloody gotta be FAE I'm thinking now, more and more.

The jars were already pasteurized 2 days before, he didnt get a chance to make them drier than usual. So potentially it may still have saturation issues... they were spawned with like 60% spawn (definitely more spawn than substrate)... Christ I hope he sees some results.

Thanks heaps for everyones input. Really appreciate the tips, would of just kept banging our heads against the wall. Shroomery is too arseholey to navigate, tis' a headfuck... I love SAB, we love SAB... Its all about teh fkn SAB!  :)
 

14 minutes ago, Psychotraits said:

I have been making Jars for two years and only just have started having success


   ^ Do you mean to say that you have been attempting to make PF style cakes for 2 years, and its only JUST started working out for you?
     Or do you mean you've been trying to spawn PF cakes to bulk for 2 years, and and only NOW having success?

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@Cue
@2XB
@Psychotraits

I'd deepthroat you all, right down to the sack if I could.

An adjustment of airflow, using polyfill and larger holes has seen my friend go from 0% success rate to 100% success rate. A simple tweak like that, and the issue is fixed :lol: !!
Trays laid with 60% spawn less than 48 hours ago are well on there way to being entirely colonized, another 2 or 3 days and they will be ready to case.

Endless gratitude guys seriously. I should of come here on behalf of my friend months ago for advice.  THANK YOU - SO FUCKING MUCH!   :)  :)  :)  :)  :)  :)  :)  :)  :)

Lotsa Luv - you mad mongrels! :wub:

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you sound pumped, nice one man! :-)

 

 

 gasses exchange -
 deepthroat
 .. away

 

 success !

 

 

 

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Yeah, I'm very very pleased, as is my friend.

Now its time for me to, return -
.. the favour

nom nom nom nom !
      5944b44aeaae7_milkmostache.thumb.jpg.5ae5fdfabe238af5b4930c865627b1d0.jpg
 

 

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lol - seriously, thanks so much benno & fellas
       you make me tingly in my fanny

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Yeah, go on, sacrifice a bit of your personal fae, hahaha

 

So happy to see you have success dude!

congrats.

 

I'm just about to change my pf cake in a shotgun to a bulk in a tray.

Going to follow those pics you got there :)

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Yeah my mate is back to 100% success rate, bloody fae mannn! Was just the simplest of tweaks that has now fixed EVERYTHING.
Should you run into dramas, keep persevering & ask other experienced individuals for advice. First hand advice is golden in this hobby.

Wear gloves when laying & pasteurize your substrate well in jars (keeping a close eye on temps) and provide PROPER FAE to your colonizing sub, if working with coir/verm you can't go wrong :)

Good luck homegroan, let us know how you go.

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