Psychoactive Mushrooms & Cacti Discussion

Casing PE helps them fruit without turning into a huge blob that they tend to do some times.

If you do need to make a casing layer, use Jiffy Organic Seed Starting Mix. You add water to it, bringing it up to field capacity and then pasteurize it for 60-90 mins at 140-160F. I use metal lasagna pans with foil on top and use my vertical propane smoker outside to "bake" it vs. my oven.
 
The Phantom said:
Casing PE helps them fruit without turning into a huge blob that they tend to do some times.

If you do need to make a casing layer, use Jiffy Organic Seed Starting Mix. You add water to it, bringing it up to field capacity and then pasteurize it for 60-90 mins at 140-160F. I use metal lasagna pans with foil on top and use my vertical propane smoker outside to "bake" it vs. my oven.
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So either way Coco I already have it or seed starting mix still need to pasteurize 60 to 90 minutes at 140 to 160 degrease. Use a clean 5 gallon plastics tub with a lid. Place coco or other in the bucket add boiling water then put the lid on and let it cook for 90 minutes then drain excess to field capacity, sound abut right ?
 
For regular cubensis reserve enough substrate to apply a 1/4" layer on top of the spawn/substrate mixture. It's not necessarily a casing but acts similar to one by providing an even layer of substrate the mycelium has to grow through, giving an even growth of mycelium and reducing overlay. It also helps hold in moisture. Making your substrate using the Bucket TEK you have pasturized your substrate and have it at field capacity based of the ratios I've mentioned previously. Nothing extra required for you to do and it will give you an even pin set for your cubes pluswith your monotub dialed in you won't have to mist.

For psilocybe that requires a casing layer use Jiffy Mix, it has the coir/peat, verm., and gypsum ratios you need plus pH balanced with lime. It would be nice if you ended up adding a lot of hot water to bring the Jiffy Mix to field capacity and pasteurize it like with the Bucket TEK. Unfortunately, it doesn't require a lot of water to bring to field capacity so there's no way to add enough hot water to get it to temperature and hold it long enough. That's why you have to heat it. I've seen others put it in oven proof bags (or grain bags) and place in a crock pot for the required time and temperature. There's also the old dunk the pillow case full of substrate in a pot of boiling water for 2 hours and squeeze the shyte out of to bring to field capacity by draining out the water.

For actual casing layers, you apply the casing once the mycelium has colonized the monotub 100%. You place the cased substrate into fruiting conditions, generally in a Martha tent where you can regulate humid and dry conditions several times a day. Or you can do it in a monotub by misting and then fanning a few times a day or with the setup you intend to use.

*Note the casing described above is not for PF TEK. For that you have to dunk your colonized cakes into cool water and then roll in vermiculite before placing inside a shotgun fruiting chamber (SGFC).
 
The Phantom said:
For regular cubensis reserve enough substrate to apply a 1/4" layer on top of the spawn/substrate mixture. It's not necessarily a casing but acts similar to one by providing an even layer of substrate the mycelium has to grow through, giving an even growth of mycelium and reducing overlay. It also helps hold in moisture. Making your substrate using the Bucket TEK you have pasturized your substrate and have it at field capacity based of the ratios I've mentioned previously. Nothing extra required for you to do and it will give you an even pin set for your cubes pluswith your monotub dialed in you won't have to mist.

For psilocybe that requires a casing layer use Jiffy Mix, it has the coir/peat, verm., and gypsum ratios you need plus pH balanced with lime. It would be nice if you ended up adding a lot of hot water to bring the Jiffy Mix to field capacity and pasteurize it like with the Bucket TEK. Unfortunately, it doesn't require a lot of water to bring to field capacity so there's no way to add enough hot water to get it to temperature and hold it long enough. That's why you have to heat it. I've seen others put it in oven proof bags (or grain bags) and place in a crock pot for the required time and temperature. There's also the old dunk the pillow case full of substrate in a pot of boiling water for 2 hours and squeeze the shyte out of to bring to field capacity by draining out the water.

For actual casing layers, you apply the casing once the mycelium has colonized the monotub 100%. You place the cased substrate into fruiting conditions, generally in a Martha tent where you can regulate humid and dry conditions several times a day. Or you can do it in a monotub by misting and then fanning a few times a day or with the setup you intend to use.

*Note the casing described above is not for PF TEK. For that you have to dunk your colonized cakes into cool water and then roll in vermiculite before placing inside a shotgun fruiting chamber (SGFC).
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I layer my mono tubs as follows, nice layer of Coco on the bottom, a jar, Coco mix, another jar... lather rinse repeat and the gold is stated above, save a little bit of Coco for the end to cover up your bird seed, grain(s) or whatever you are using as spawn.
 
So will my plan of putting like 1/4 or 1/3 of a brick into a clean 5gallon can and pour boiling water in then put the lid on the keep it hot long enough then once the tub is fully colonized use the coco once cooled and adjusted to the right field capacity spread a 1/4 to 1/2 inch over the top of the Big White Chunk of Mycelian then wait again for pins. Am I on the right track ?
 
PCaddict said:
So will my plan of putting like 1/4 or 1/3 of a brick into a clean 5gallon can and pour boiling water in then put the lid on the keep it hot long enough then once the tub is fully colonized use the coco once cooled and adjusted to the right field capacity spread a 1/4 to 1/2 inch over the top of the Big White Chunk of Mycelian then wait again for pins. Am I on the right track ?
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Put the 1/4" layer on right after mixing the spawn and substrate, it will already be at field capacity. For shrooms that absolutely require a casing layer you would be correct but would want to use an actual casing substrate like the Jiffy mix.

Watch this video and you will see what I mean.
 
FYI those exact totes he uses are at Big Lots for $8 and they are the 66 quart totes. Oddly enough I found out the 66 quart and 54 quart Sterilite totes have nearly identical footprints. I believe a few pages back I had stated to use the 54 quart over the 66 quart but shouldn't have since the only difference between them is the height. Plus I noticed they are pretty hard to come by in stores and you are paying a fortune for them online. So if you are looking for some and have a Big Lots nearby check them out online and buy some to pick-up in store.
 
The Phantom said:
Put the 1/4" layer on right after mixing the spawn and substrate, it will already be at field capacity. For shrooms that absolutely require a casing layer you would be correct but would want to use an actual casing substrate like the Jiffy mix.

Watch this video and you will see what I mean.
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Nice video, My trash bag install didn't come out as nice looking as his... I'M jealous. :rofl:
 
Doesn't get much better than that surface area coverage. Beautiful.

I think the Z strain jar is good to go, it's very thick cottony(like a thick cotton cloud) looking now and you can see the branching (sort of) with the mycelium. In the beginning, it looked almost like agar isolation with two different sectors(like a dome), they have combined together now for a thick cotton layer. The jar is creating heat and steaming humidity on the jar so it's tough to get a good solid picture. The other two jars are doing nothing, so I shot them up again just for experimental sake. I don't expect them to do anything, but I gave them a good squirt along the glass to see what happens.

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View media item 1795382Current Picture from this morning

I know that cobweb spreads fast so it's definitely not Cob. 3 days in between the initial picture at the top.
 
The Phantom said:
Try to get the grain bags a little warmer.

For making substrate you want 650 grams coir, 2 quarts vermiculite, 1 cup gypsum, and 5 quarts boiling water. That is enough for a 66 quart monotub with 5 quarts of grain spawn mixed in.
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Ok well i only got 2 jars of grain spawn going rite nw so will tht be to much substrate for that? Or can i jus do like half of these ratios for like a half batch?
 
Checking tonight on the grain bags and I'm sitting at about 75% showing signs of mycelium.

Here's a few photos.
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