Grow mycelium of porcini mushrooms at home. Cultivation of white mushrooms. Boletus mycelium sowing

29.09.2021

White mushrooms have long been called the king of mushrooms. Beautiful hats with thick legs in a basket are the first thing a mushroom picker dreams of when he goes to the forest for a “quiet hunt”.

This mushroom is really very beautiful. In addition, it is also very useful. When dried and cooked, the mushroom retains its white juicy structure, which is why it was called white. It is extremely tasty, and when cooked it emits a pleasant nutty aroma. Why not try growing porcini mushrooms at home?

About boletus

White is just one of the many names for porcini mushrooms. And they are called in different ways: clean, cow, baby, bear cubs, expensive mushroom, belevik, capercaillie, and of course mushrooms. But no matter what they are called, they look almost the same:

The cap of the boletus is almost always brown. With age, only the convexity of the cap changes in the mushroom: from the semi-cylindrical shape inherent in a small mushroom, it gradually turns into an almost flat shape. The average cap diameter of an adult mushroom is approximately 20 cm.
The boletus leg is always whitish with vertical brown streaks. At first it has the shape of a barrel, and with age it turns into a powerful, dense cylinder.

Varieties

Boletus has many forms. They depend mainly on the trees with which it grows in symbiosis.

White fungus can grow:

Under the pine. This variety of mushrooms looks the most colorful against the background of other white mushrooms. His cap is tinted brown, and his stem is slightly purple with a thickening at the bottom.
under the spruce . This is the most common type of porcini mushroom in Russia. The hat has a reddish-brown hue with spots and a rim around the edge. The stem of the mushroom is barrel-shaped, covered with a mesh to the very middle.
Under the oak These are strong mushrooms with elastic red hats with a slightly grayish tint.
In mixed forests. Porcini mushrooms growing in mixed forests have a dark bronze color of the caps, and the caps are slightly wrinkled. The legs of these mushrooms are reddish.

In the photo, porcini mushrooms on a personal plot

Such forms of mushrooms are not a standard. After all, mushrooms growing in dark places will be painted a little lighter than those that grow in the sun.

We prepare planting material at home

It’s good when there is a store nearby where you can buy mycelium (mycelium) of white fungus. But what to do when it's not there? That's right, prepare the seed yourself.

But before going into the forest for mycelium, you must:

Determine the place where your homemade porcini mushrooms will grow: under a birch, under a spruce or other tree.
Tune in to collect mushrooms only under a certain type of tree. For example, if you plant porcini mushrooms under a birch, then you need to collect mushrooms only under birches, etc.

For seed material, only 10-15 mushrooms are needed. Moreover, they can be either with worms or rotten, or healthy.

In mushrooms (already at home), the lower spongy layer under the cap (hymenophore) is cut off, passed through a meat grinder and diluted with water. The ratio of water to ground mushrooms is 7/2. By the way, the caps can be ground whole, anyway, the solution is made in the same ratio.
Some gardeners recommend adding alcohol to the water - no more than 4 tablespoons of alcohol per bucket.

The "mushroom" solution should stand for several days. During this time, the pulp of the mushrooms will float, and the separated spores will sink to the bottom. The upper (pop-up) layer is carefully removed with a spoon or drained, but not thrown away - this procedure must be carried out several times, constantly adding fresh water to the bucket. After draining the water completely, get a saturated concentration of fungal spores. This is the mycelium - the inoculum of the porcini fungus.

Photo of porcini mushrooms growing in the country in strawberry plantings

Preparing a site for planting mushrooms

Cultivation of white mushrooms start by identifying the trees under which it is planned to plant mushrooms. The place on the home site should not be too dark and too light, but always well ventilated.
Under the tree, the top layer of soil is removed with a width of at least 10 and not more than 15 cm. The removal radius is 0.5 meters right up to the tree trunk itself, but the roots do not need to be touched (only bare). The place for planting homemade porcini mushrooms is ready.

You can also grow porcini mushrooms at home:

in greenhouses;
in the basement (with lighting);
in the garden, like a plantation, but on a darkened plot of land.

If the planting is done right in the garden, then first a small pit is pulled out with a depth of 20 to 30 cm and filled with a nutrient mixture - grass, fallen leaves, tree bark, dust (mixture layer - from 7 to 10 cm). It is sprinkled on top with manure humus or earth, which is taken near the trees. The next layer is the same nutrient mixture, but its thickness is not more than 3 cm. The last layer is ordinary garden soil (thickness - from 3 to 5 cm). The plot for the cultivation of porcini mushroom - boletus at home right in the garden is ready.
They also prepare the soil if it is planned to grow "expensive" mushrooms in a greenhouse or in a closed space (in the basement).

Boletus mycelium sowing

The mycelium of the white fungus prepared in advance for planting is poured directly onto the plot prepared for growing - on the roots of trees or on the nutrient mixture in the garden. From above, the mycelium is covered with a mushroom mixture, which was removed from the bucket when the spores of the fungus were separated. All this is covered with soil removed under a tree or simple garden soil, if planting is done in a garden.

Mushroom planting care

Home white mushroom almost ready to grow, but for this you need to take care of him. And the main condition for good growth of boletus is humidity, because porcini mushrooms prefer to grow at a humidity of 90–92 percent.
Watering is carried out regularly every 7 days, and if the summer is too hot, then more often. At one time, up to 30 liters of water are poured onto the mycelium. Watering is desirable to carry out carefully, drip irrigation.

Read the article

You can also feed the mycelium. Real experts in growing mushrooms at home recommend fertilizing the area with coffee grounds. They claim that it helps to accelerate the growth of porcini mushrooms almost twice. Another plus of coffee grounds is that this mixture will protect the boletus mycelium from mold, moths, midges, as well as fungal diseases.

To make the fertilizer even more nutritious, you need to add a little freshly ground coffee (15%) to the thick remaining after coffee, and also enrich the mixture with a complex of nutritious mineral supplements.

A tablespoon of coffee grounds is added per square meter: 2 liters of soil is mixed with grounds, evenly scattered on a garden bed with mushroom crops. Coffee grounds can be mixed with mycelium immediately before planting it in the ground - for 100 grams of mycelium 3 tablespoons of grounds.

Another trick of home mushroom pickers: if the summer is dry or you simply do not have the opportunity to water frequently, you can add hydrogel to the soil (3 g of hydrogel is added per 1 square meter). This will help the water stay in the top layers of the soil.

Only in the 2nd year, you can count on a rich harvest of home-made porcini mushrooms, which can be rolled into jars, fried or cooked with them in delicious soup.

Self-growing porcini mushrooms at home seems to many to be a very attractive idea. After all, the white mushroom (or, as it is also called, boletus) is almost the most famous and common edible mushroom growing on the territory of the Russian Federation. It looks simple, but expressive - a thick white leg and a fleshy brown hat. Porcini mushrooms are now used to make sauces, soups and many other delicious dishes. One of the features of the white fungus is that it does not change its color during heat treatment.

Under natural conditions, mushrooms grow in moderately humid places with different levels of illumination, under deciduous (oak, birch, beech) or coniferous (pine and spruce) trees.

Independent cultivation of porcini mushrooms requires the creation of conditions that will be as similar as possible to natural ones. It is not so easy, it takes some effort and some patience to achieve the result. For example, oyster mushrooms are much easier to grow - many do it even on the balcony.

Boletus mushrooms can be grown in two main ways:

in the open air (for example, in your summer cottage or personal plot);
in the premises.

The second method, which involves the creation of a completely artificial environment, needs more significant investments. However, with the right approach, they can certainly pay off.

Seed preparation

Whichever method of these two is chosen, first you need to prepare a special seed. And here you need to know a lot of subtleties. Fruiting bodies of ordinary boletus mushrooms are suitable as raw materials. Moreover, if you want to grow them on a personal plot under an oak, then you need to take those white mushrooms that grow under the oak. The need for such accuracy is due to the fact that mushrooms interact quite closely with the trees next to which they are located.

In the collected fruit bodies, all the legs are separated from the caps. In the future, we only need hats, and even dried and wormy ones can be put into action. They need to be placed in a bowl of cold water (by the way, you can add alcohol to the water at the rate of 3 cups per 10 liters, this will further stimulate the germination of spores). In addition, here you need to add 1 gram of potassium permanganate and leave for a couple of hours.

Then you should add sugar to this bowl - 15-20 teaspoons per 10 liters of water. That's almost all - the mixture just needs to be infused in some heated room (if it's winter outside). The result is a liquid containing a large number of boletus spores.

Buying ready-made mycelium for growing

You can go the simpler route and buy ready-made porcini mushroom mycelium in gardening stores. Foreign goods are considered the best in this market, but in any case, it is worth buying a small trial batch first.

When buying, be sure to specify:

strain and variety;
fouling rates;
the resistance of this mycelium to mold;
storage period.

In addition, it does not hurt to talk with gardeners who have already grown mushrooms on their site - they will certainly give useful recommendations.

A good quality mycelium should be a rich red color with small patches of yellow. If there are green and black spots on the mycelium, and a nasty ammonia smell comes from the package, then the product is damaged and cannot be used.

Purchased mycelium can be stored in the refrigerator at a temperature not exceeding +4 degrees Celsius. Here it can be kept without problems for up to three months.

Proper preparation of substrates

Another important step is the preparation of the substrate, that is, the mixture in which the white fungus can grow. This substrate consists of sunflower husks, straw, hardwood sawdust, buckwheat, etc. But it should not contain mold and rotten pieces at all, otherwise it will not work to grow your own mushroom crop on the site.

The substrate, before placing mycelium or spores in it, must be saturated with moisture. There are two methods for this - steaming and boiling water. Regardless of the chosen processing technology, the substrate must retain such a property as air permeability. The material during processing can be left directly in plastic bags.

How to grow mushrooms in open spaces

Now let's figure out how the cultivation of porcini mushrooms takes place in the garden. Of course, there must be a suitable tree (or trees) in this area. And within a radius of one meter from this tree, the first thing to do is to remove a layer of earth about 15 centimeters thick. On the roots (which in no case should be damaged!) You need to pour the seed with spores. For every 25 square centimeters, you need about 350 milliliters of seed. Then you need to fill everything back with earth and pour several buckets of water (it is better to pour along the trunk, carefully so as not to blur the spores). The optimal sowing time when choosing this method is from mid-August to mid-September.

Mycelium (mycelium) must be planted on the site differently. To do this, a pit is pulled out with a depth of 30 centimeters and a width of 1.5 square meters. A substrate is placed in it in layers of 10 centimeters - it is alternated with the ground in such a way that a bed 20 centimeters high is formed. It is worth, by the way, to provide it with sloping edges, this will allow moisture to drain and not stagnate.

Planting mycelium in this case is necessary in a checkerboard pattern, and the distance between them should be 30 centimeters or more. Then the bed needs to be watered and covered with foliage.

The optimal time for planting mycelium is the end of summer or the beginning of September, but it must be borne in mind that the harvest in this case will not be in the same, but only next year. And as soon as the next summer comes, you need to remember about the mushroom bed and start watering it at least once every seven days.

Growing porcini mushrooms from mycelium in your garden is more difficult than growing from spores, but ultimately it yields a higher yield per tree.

How to grow mushrooms indoors

Here the difficulty lies in the fact that for planting it is necessary to prepare not only the substrate and seed, but also the room itself. It can be a basement of a house, a special greenhouse or, for example, an ordinary barn.

The substrate material for planting mushrooms indoors must be boiled for 60-80 minutes without laying it out of standard plastic bags. Then you need to drain the water (for example, by making several holes in the bag) and put the substrate under something heavy. After cooling, it can already be taken to the room where the mycelium was prepared for planting (it is the purchased mycelium that is needed here, and not the independently prepared planting mixture) and where the mushrooms will subsequently grow. This room must be sterile, for which it should be treated with a one percent chlorine solution.

When mixing mycelium and substrates, ventilation, if any, should be turned off so that the spores do not scatter. This procedure occurs as follows: mycelium and substrate are placed on a disinfected clean table and mixed manually. The weight of planting material should be 3-5% of the weight of the substrate.

Then the already grafted substrate must be folded into whole bags - from 5 to 15 kilograms each. Moreover, the substrate should be compacted as tightly as possible. Then you need to make a few neat holes with the blade. Cuts are best done at an angle of 45 degrees, and each of them should be no more than 5 millimeters.

Then these bags need to be installed on pre-prepared incubation shelves. There should be ventilation holes along the edges of each shelf. Air should circulate freely here, but only after the incubation period of the mycelium, which lasts three weeks.

In addition, there should be a distance of at least 5 centimeters between the bags. A comfortable temperature for growing boletus mushrooms is about +25 degrees. If the temperature exceeds +30, then the mushrooms can get a heat stroke and not germinate.

Plus, the room should have high humidity (from 85 to 95 percent). And so that mold does not start in such conditions, every day you need to clean the room with a chlorine solution. Such difficulties, of course, scare away many potential breeders, and they prefer either to plant mushrooms on the site, or not to plant mushrooms at all. But in fact, the possible result may well be more than worth the effort, and quite a few people have already turned growing mushrooms indoors into a good business.

Porcini mushrooms will begin to bear fruit for the first time about a month after planting.

In order for the mushrooms to be dense, and not watery, it is worth watering the bags with water using a spray bottle once a day. And this water should have a temperature in the range from +10 to +25 degrees. To prevent moisture from stagnating, the room must be ventilated after watering.

The time of the second fruiting will come in a couple of weeks. In general, with proper care, porcini mushrooms grown in an enclosed space will produce a crop for six months continuously. Of course, some bags can get moldy, and they need to be taken out of the room in time, but throwing them out is not always relevant - they can be a good organic fertilizer.

So, the cultivation of porcini mushrooms can be carried out in several ways, each of which has its own difficulties and characteristics. You need to choose, of course, the one that will be easier for you to implement. Note that growing mushrooms in the backyard or in the basement can be not only a pleasant hobby, but also a completely successful business. At least there is a demand for white mushrooms among the population.

The white mushroom is deservedly and rightfully considered the standard for other mushrooms. He looks attractive - with a fleshy brown hat on a white pot-bellied leg, and his taste is excellent. When fried, porcini mushrooms emit a special, nutty aroma. It got its name - white - mushroom because its incision does not darken during drying and cooking, while maintaining a juicy, appetizing structure. And today we will consider the cultivation of porcini mushrooms at home and not only.

White mushroom: description

Almost everywhere, white mushroom is also called boletus. And also it is called a bear cub, a belovik, a capercaillie. No matter how else this forest handsome man is called in numerous corners of Russia, he always looks distinctive:

The cap of the boletus is dyed brown. It changes its convexity with the age of the fungus. From a semi-cylindrical shape in a small mushroom, it gradually makes a transition to an almost flat, about 20 cm in diameter, hat of an adult mushroom.
The stalk is always whitish, with characteristic brownish vertical streaks. At first, it has the shape of a barrel, and as it grows, it stretches into a dense, powerful cylinder.

Now you can visually distinguish the white mushroom (you received the description) from other forest mushrooms.

Varieties of white mushrooms

White fungus has many forms, and their varieties depend on the trees under which the fungus grows and enters into symbiosis with:

The pine form is perhaps the most colorful of the porcini species. It has a hat of a beautiful brown color and a leg with a slightly purple tint, slightly thickened from below.
The spruce form is the most common in central Russia. The hat is brown-reddish, with spots and a border along the edge. The stem is barrel-shaped, covered to the middle with a fine mesh.
Oak form - strong porcini mushrooms with elastic brown hats with a grayish tint.
Dark bronze form - the name speaks for itself. Hats are dark, wrinkled; legs are brownish.

Mushrooms growing in shady areas have a lighter cap color. And their brothers, who grew up in the sun, have a rich brown top. The mushroom does not tolerate heavily shaded and mossy places at all. For example, it will not grow in a deaf forest. And he will choose a slightly shaded or sunny place that is comfortable for himself.

We grow mushrooms in the country

If a mushroom picker returns from the forest with a full basket of boletus mushrooms, it means that he did not pick mushrooms in vain. Many are wondering if it is possible to grow mushrooms in the country in order to admire the beautiful landscape, and, of course, it is guaranteed to have a rare product on the table. Yes, growing the king of mushrooms in a garden plot is quite possible, although not an entirely easy task. You need to know the subtleties and features of breeding this fastidious forest strong man, but as a result of hard work, the first white mushrooms will grow near your country house.

So, growing mushrooms in the country. It will not be easy to achieve results because the white fungus belongs to the group of mycorrhiza-forming, which indicates their long and very complex fusion and interlacing with the roots of the trees under which they live. This is a very complex and vital symbiosis for fungi. Without a tree, or rather its roots, the so-called mushroom root cannot form and the fruit growing on the surface cannot develop. Therefore, growing white mushrooms on a bare area, alas, will not work.

A long-standing and well-established way of growing - in an area where trees grow at the age of ten to thirty years. White fungus settles under pine, spruce, oak, birch, beech. Compliance with tree species when transplanting mycelium is necessary. The more similar the conditions of the dacha plantation of mushrooms to their forest location, the more likely they are to successfully take root.

White mushrooms at home

If you wish, you can master the cultivation of mushrooms at home, having studied the accumulated experience of scientists from Holland. With the help of the technologies recommended by them, you can start growing the product in greenhouses and dug cellars.

Breeding a plantation with an intensive method, namely, it is adopted at home, has its own difficulties. One of them is a considerable investment, the purchase of equipment to ensure the required temperature and humidity in the room. But the advantages of this method of cultivation are considerable - fertility throughout the season and a good ripening rate. For effective breeding indoors, it is recommended to use growing from mycelium.

planting material requirements

It is advisable to purchase planting material from suppliers with recommendations, carefully study all the initial data of the mycelium indicated on the label. It is very important to pay attention to the smell and color of the mycelium. If there is a slight ammonia smell, immediately reject the batch of planting material - it has been overheated and is no longer viable. The color of a healthy exudate is orange with a slight yellowness.

Having brought home the packages with the purchased mycelium, you need to cool them, ventilate them, and only then proceed with the preparation before laying. The contents of the bags are crushed without tearing the packaging. Thus, they maintain a gentle and adaptive temperature regime for the future mycelium. When laying, sterility is very important:

it is necessary to work with gloves;
rooms for growing porcini mushrooms and laying mycelium should be separate;
opening the package, it is necessary to treat with a disinfectant solution.

Mushroom cultivation technology

To complete the topic of the previous paragraph, let's start with the method of sprouting the crop at home. So, growing mushrooms at home. Here are the main stages of work in the room:

Boiling in bags for 1-1.5 hours and subsequent cooling of the substrate. (Poke holes in bags to drain water).
Mixing mycelium and substrate on disinfected tables. The presence of domestic material should be at the level of 5%, and imported - 2.5%.
Packing the mixture into bags. Tamp the grafted substrate tightly into bags, flatten one of the sides and make several cuts for the germination of mushrooms.
Place the bags vertically on the shelves. Watering is normal, without strong waterlogging. Ventilation is a must.
If the care was correct, the harvest of mushrooms can be harvested for at least six months.

This is how mushrooms are grown at home. Yes, it's quite difficult, but it's worth it.

Growing methods in the garden

Growing porcini mushrooms at home is very different from growing in the backyard. But first things first.

To grow porcini mushrooms on the site, first prepare the site for laying the mycelium. Compost or earth with peat is laid on the top layer of soil previously removed with a shovel. Lay the planting material, cover it with the previously removed layer of turf.

The most effective options for harvesting seed material are to bring a few pieces of mycelium the size of a chicken egg from the forest. Such blanks are planted in the soil without cultivation, it is only important to observe at least two conditions:

The trees under which mushrooms grew in nature should be of the same breed as the plants at the new planting site.
You need to dig out the material very carefully - porcini mushrooms are hard to grow together with the roots and restore communication with the satellite tree.

Sowing forest mycelium

How to grow porcini mushrooms if it is not possible to purchase high-quality planting material?

A very good effect is given by the method of sowing the mycelium using the cap and the tubular part of the porcini fungus. 5-6 mature hats are taken, even with wormholes, and soaked for a day in a bucket of water. Then the contents are kneaded by hand. The thick is separated into another container. A thick mass is the body of the fungus, and it will also come in handy. The remaining liquid with a large number of spores spills the bare roots of the tree, then everything is covered with a layer of thick mushroom substance and sprinkled with previously removed soil. It is necessary to carefully water the planted mycelium and produce subsequent watering once a week in the absence of rain.

Now you are familiar with the cultivation of porcini mushrooms at home, and in the garden, where, with the correct observance of all technologies, you can get a crop of mushrooms from the first time in a year or two. Good luck!

Due to its rich taste and delicate aroma, the porcini mushroom is considered the most valuable trophy from the “silent hunt”. However, not all gourmets like to wander through the forests in search of prey, but this delicacy is not cheap. However, there is a way out! Let's find out how to grow porcini mushrooms on your own site.

How to prepare seed yourself

To grow mushrooms at home, you need to stock up on seed. To cook it yourself, you need to find overripe mushrooms in the forest (dried and wormy ones will do).

About 10 hats are needed to obtain seed. At home, separate them from the stalks and prepare a container of water. Alcohol (3 tablespoons per 10 liters), potassium permanganate (1 g per bucket) and granulated sugar (50 g) can be added to the water. Mash the caps in your hands and add them to the water to make a homogeneous mass. It should be infused for about 10 hours. After that, strain it. Mushroom spores are contained in water, cake is not needed. Use the hats collected in the forest within a few hours, otherwise they will deteriorate. You cannot freeze them.

To grow mushrooms at home, you can use the mycelium brought from the forest: after finding an adult mushroom in the forest, cut off a layer of earth around it about 25x25 cm. At home, you can completely lay the mycelium in the prepared soil or divide it into 8–20 pieces.

Buying ready-made mycelium

Growing porcini mushrooms at home is possible with the help of purchased mycelium. The mycelium of the white fungus can be both dry and already germinated, placed in a substrate. If you intend to purchase it online, choose trusted and reliable suppliers. When buying directly, please note: the germinated mycelium of porcini mushrooms should be red in color with small yellow patches. The presence of black and green areas, as well as a strong smell of ammonia, indicate that the product is damaged.

In open areas, the mycelium of porcini mushrooms should be planted under a forest tree. The first harvest can be expected next year. Fruiting from the mycelium lasts an average of 3-4 years, but if beneficial microorganisms are added to the water for irrigation (for example, Baikal EM-1), this period can be extended to seven years and also increase productivity.

Substrate selection and preparation

To grow mushrooms in the garden, you can use a purchased substrate or cook it yourself. To do this, mix straw, sawdust of deciduous trees, sunflower husks. Other sources recommend alternating layers: one from a mixture of fallen leaves with sawdust, the second from the same mixture with the addition of soil. It is important that none of the components contain rot and mold. Before planting mushrooms, the substrate must be properly moistened, and it is recommended to use boiling water or steam - this will also kill harmful bacteria.

Growing features

First, decide where you will grow the crop: in the basement, greenhouse or on the site. Each method has its own advantages and disadvantages.

First, let's look at how to grow porcini mushrooms on the site.

Growing porcini mushrooms in a personal plot suggests the presence of coniferous or deciduous forest trees there. Fruit ones will not work - you need to breed porcini mushrooms in the country away from any cultivated plants, be it trees, shrubs or vegetables.

Remove the top layer of earth (about 15 cm) around the selected tree. It is desirable that the roots be exposed, but in no case should they be damaged. If you are using an infusion with spores, pour it onto the ground (about 350 ml per 25 sq. cm). Then cover again with earth and water abundantly - either along the trunk or using shallow irrigation. In this way, you can plant a white mushroom in the country in August-September.

To plant mycelium, make a depression of 1.5 square meters near the tree. m in diameter and 30 cm deep. Place the substrate in it, alternating it with the ground in layers of 10 cm. The height of such a bed should be 20 cm above ground level. Plant the mycelium in the substrate in a checkerboard pattern at a distance of 30 cm between the bags. Carefully water the bed, cover it with a layer of fallen leaves.

Planting mycelium can be carried out from May to September.

Care of planted mushrooms consists mainly in abundant watering. For the winter, it is recommended to cover them with a thick layer of foliage, spruce branches or straw.

Growing mushrooms in a greenhouse or basement implies the creation of a warm and humid microclimate, since it will not work to grow a lot of porcini mushrooms in dry air. In order for the greenhouse atmosphere to meet these requirements, it is recommended to install several barrels of water or wet sawdust there.

The substrate for the premises is the same as for open areas. In the basement, they fill bags with small cuts. Sowing is recommended to be done with mycelium. The bags should be placed no closer than 5 cm from each other.

During the incubation period (until the caps appear), the temperature should be maintained at + 23–25 ° C; a temperature of +30 ° C will destroy most of the mycelium of the grown crop.

Lighting is not required at this time. In the greenhouse, it is desirable to muffle it as much as possible, in the basement simply do not turn it on. Ventilation is not necessary, but the humidity should not be more than 90% so that mold does not start. Also, for its prevention, disinfection is periodically done with a solution of chlorine.

Growing mushrooms need different care: when hats appear, the temperature is lowered to +10 ° C. Now the greenhouse or cellar should be well ventilated - oxygen is necessary for the normal development of mushrooms. Lighting is required for 5-6 hours a day. To grow porcini mushrooms in a greenhouse, it must be muted, without direct sunlight. It is advisable to spray mushrooms from a spray bottle 2 times a day: this will make their structure more dense. The first harvest can usually be harvested after 20–25 days.

Moldy bags should be removed from the premises immediately. Mushrooms can no longer be grown on them, but they can be a good fertilizer.

Be aware that boletus mushrooms do not take root well without being in close proximity to trees, and the first attempts to grow in the basement may not be successful. But if you intend to start breeding porcini mushrooms in this way, choose the Dutch mycelium: in Holland, a variety of mushrooms was bred, which grows most easily "in captivity".

But having mastered all the subtleties, indoors you can harvest mushrooms all year round or even start growing porcini mushrooms on an industrial scale: since it is more difficult to grow boletus than champignon or oyster mushroom, it is much more appreciated.

Finally, some secrets of mushroom growing.

When collecting seed on your own, boletus mushrooms that grow near the type of tree that is on your site will take root better. With the physical transfer of the mycelium, their appearance must necessarily match.

It is recommended to disinfect the substrate or earth 2–3 hours before planting with a solution of tannins. It can be prepared from cheap black tea: 50-100 g is poured into 1 liter of boiling water and brewed until completely cooled. Another option is oak bark. It will need 30 g per 1 liter of water. The bark should be boiled for an hour, as it boils, adding water to the original volume. For each "mushroom" tree, you need 2-3 liters of one of these solutions.

Video "Self-growing porcini mushrooms"

From this video you will learn how to grow porcini mushrooms on your site.

Picking mushrooms in the forest is a pleasant thing, but it would be doubly pleasant to do this while staying in your backyard or in your own dacha. White mushrooms grow in nature in unshaded, moderately humid places, under deciduous (oak, birch, beech) or coniferous (spruce, pine) trees. Therefore, their successful breeding at home is possible when creating conditions that are as close as possible to natural ones.

Growing these representatives of the mushroom kingdom at home is not an easy task. They will require more attention and patience than, for example, oyster mushrooms, the harvest of which can be obtained even at home on the balcony. What is the technology for growing mushrooms?

Kira Stoletova

Mushrooms, or, as they are commonly called, porcini mushrooms, are one of the most delicious. They contain a lot of vitamins, fiber and vegetable protein. This is a seasonal mushroom that appears only under the condition of a warm autumn. However, you can grow porcini mushrooms on the windowsill.

Features of growing porcini mushroom

Growing porcini mushrooms at home is quite difficult. They need symbiosis with tree species characteristic of their natural habitat: oaks, birches or conifers, as well as a thick cover of moss.

These mushrooms are very picky about the climate, they need good lighting, humidified air. It is not easy to create such conditions at home.

Requirements for the premises

Porcini mushrooms are also grown at home on the windowsill. For good growth, a room that retains heat and moisture well is suitable for them. You also need special equipment:

Heating system with temperature control: for this type of mushrooms, the optimal temperature option is fluctuations within + 15 ... + 17 ° С.
Ventilation system: fresh air is needed for growing. In a closed room with moist air, the growth of boletus slows down significantly.
Lighting: mycelium during the development of fruiting bodies should be well highlighted. Suitable lamps with diffused light (daylight), which are used in greenhouses.

Before planting the mycelium, the room is disinfected. For disinfection, aqueous solutions of active preparations are usually used, which act on the membranes of microorganism cells and destroy them.

Irina Selyutina (Biologist):
When disinfecting, it is important to remember:
The usual household disinfectants such as "whiteness" or detergents are not suitable: they do not give a lasting effect.
The safest is the use of smoke bombs.
The higher the quality of the drug, the shorter the disinfection time, i.e. drug exposure.
Most often, Lysoformin-3000, medical hydrogen peroxide (30-40%), chloramine or bleach are used for disinfection.
When disinfecting, be sure to:

the presence of protective equipment, most often these are rubber gloves;
avoid contact with the surface of the skin or mucous membranes of both concentrated and diluted active solutions.

Window sills on which mushrooms will be grown are especially carefully treated. To do this, use a 0.4% solution of copper (II) sulfate. It has a more familiar name for our hearing - copper sulfate. Walls and ceilings are treated with lime with the addition of copper sulfate. Do not interfere with the processing of a smoke bomb.

Substrate preparation

The main difficulty in growing this species is to create conditions close to the natural habitat of porcini mushrooms. The substrate for planting is sold ready-made in garden stores. It is also made independently. To do this, take:

dry leaves of oak or birch;
small branches of coniferous plants;
dry moss (a little).

All ingredients are crushed, sifted sand and dry clay are added in a ratio of 4: 1. To grow a lot of white mushrooms at home on the windowsill, the substrate must be infused for 14 days in a warm and always dry room.

Mycelium selection

For sowing porcini fungus, use ready-made store mycelium or made at home. For self-preparation, ripe mushrooms are taken, even slightly rotten specimens are suitable. It is only important that the hat is intact.

Hats are carefully cut off from the legs, passed through a meat grinder or chopped with a sharp knife. Then the resulting mass is left for 3-4 hours in a solution of:

potassium permanganate - 1 g per 10 liters;
sugar - 10-13 cubes.

As a result, you will get an aqueous solution with spores - a kind of liquid preparation for planting.

planting a mushroom

Growing porcini mushrooms at home on a windowsill is easier in prepared containers. The substrate is evenly distributed in pots, the thickness should be at least 25-30 cm. The top layer is lightly pressed by hand - the surface should be more or less even.

A drainage layer 3-4 cm thick is placed at the bottom of the tank. This helps the soil to breathe well. Then the mycelium is evenly distributed or the liquid preparation with spores is spilled. From above it is sprinkled with a layer of substrate (3-5 cm), without pressing it. During planting, the room should be at least 25 ° C, the same temperature should be maintained until the first shoots appear.

The finished structure in the tank should look like this (starting from the bottom):

drainage 3-4 cm;
substrate (25-30 cm);
mycelium;
surface layer of the substrate (3-5 cm).

Care

The first shoots of boletus in the apartment appear in about a week. To do this, maintain a certain humidity of the room, the optimum temperature and good lighting. Next, the temperature is reduced to 15-17°C.

The soil is sprayed daily with a spray bottle. If heaters are used, place dishes with water next to them or hang wet towels. This helps maintain a high level of humidity in the room.

There must be good air circulation in the room to provide seedlings with enough oxygen. Also, the white fungus loves light, so the lamps are turned on every day for 6-7 hours.

After the first crop appears, the mycelium often rises to the surface of the soil. So that it does not dry out and the collection of mushrooms in the future is good, it must be sprinkled with another thin layer of the substrate. For a greater yield, ammonium nitrate is added to the soil in a ratio of 1:5.

Harvesting

The first harvest appears 25-30 days after planting the mycelium. Porcini mushrooms yield within 35-45 days with a break of 2 weeks. Instead of cutting with a knife, they are recommended to be carefully twisted: this way the mycelium will not be damaged.

It is really possible to grow a good crop of porcini mushrooms at home, but this is an extremely time-consuming process and not everything can work out the first time. It is important to provide the right conditions: sufficient lighting, temperature and high humidity levels. The first harvest will appear in 3 weeks.

Deservedly and rightfully considered the standard for other mushrooms. He looks attractive - with a fleshy brown hat on a white pot-bellied leg, and his taste is excellent. When fried, porcini mushrooms emit a special, nutty aroma. It got its name - white - mushroom because its incision does not darken during drying and cooking, while maintaining a juicy, appetizing structure. And today we will consider the cultivation of porcini mushrooms at home and not only.