Zera Farm Log-Grown Shiitake Mushrooms

We are excited to announce that we are starting to cultivate shiitake mushrooms! But how? Why? Where?

Why mushrooms?

I became interested in mushrooms as a young kid playing Nintendo Super Mario Brothers! Mycophelia set in during most of my adolescence and adulthood, with the fear coming from a lack of education.

As our dreams of leaving the city for a farm began to crystalize over the last few years, my interest in mushrooms did as well.

(Link to shrooms image)

City Shrooms

Over the last 3 years, our family attended monthly Skill Shares at a tiny farm outside of Philadelphia. Each attendee was asked to bring a skill and a dish to share. There was always chaga tea brewing at these events, and the host was a forager. That was my first exposure to chaga and mushroom medicine. At first it seemed weird and gross. Slowly, my curiosity outgrew my fear!

At these events, my family and I learned about grafting plants, non-violent communication, slack lining, permaculture, meditation, lock picking, instrument making, herbalism, jewelry making, and various other awesome skills! I overheard numerous conversations about wild foraging mushrooms and other herbs and plants.

Photo from one of the Skill Shares by Noise Soul Cinema

Excitement Builds

Before we left Philly last spring, I attended a local food event around the corner from our home. I met one of the owners of Mycopolitan Mushrooms and I came home with an oyster mushroom growing kit! Those mushrooms grew beautifully in the basement of our rowhouse as we prepared to move! I was amazed that such beautiful, delicious, medicinal shrooms could grow so quickly, with so little work (by me!), in a city basement. Seeing that I could do it on my own gave me some confidence, and cemented my desire to dive deeper into the myco world.

During that time, I had been watching a lot of videos on the Cornell Small Farms YouTube Channel. As we got closer to being able to purchase our farm, I realized that forest-grown crops would be ideal because the property has 5 acres of woods.

As I have been learning more about Korean Natural Farming, I’ve become more fascinated with bacteria and fungus. I love that there is an entire world of relationships with these microorganisms that we know very little about!

Education

Fast forward: we moved to our farm in June of 2017. In January 2018, I attended the Shiitake Viability course at the Cornell Cooperative Extension office in Schuyler County. Steve Gabriel of Wellspring Forest Farm & School taught the course. Here is a lot of the information covered during the course, including this spreadsheet to help with the financial planning and execution of starting a shiitake production on a commercial scale.

I also took the Baskets to Pallets course with Cornell Small Farms in January 2018. This two-day event focused on wholesale marketing for farmers. This event helped me feel more prepared and educated for approaching restaurants and other sales channels as a grower.

Olga of Smugtown Mushrooms teaches us about mycelium at Groundswell.

In April 2018, I took a Medicinal Mushroom course at Groundswell in Ithaca. It was great to learn about the medicinal qualities of mushrooms, how to make mushroom medicine, and the laws governing the sale of crafted medicines in New York.

Equipment

We decided to move forward with starting a 1000 log production (inoculating about 300 logs a year). This was the size recommended based on the Cornell course. We purchased our spawn from Fungi Ally, our tools from Field & Forest, and our bolts from Tratt Logging.

Mentorship

As part of the shiitake course, Steve offered one-on-one mentoring to farmers that were seriously taking the first steps toward commercial production this year. During that phone call, we were able to discuss our site-specific questions and concerns. We are also on an email forum now where we can ask and answer questions with other growers.

Experience

To get some hands-on experience, my partner and I went to Wellspring Forest Farm & School to help inoculate logs for the season. It was very helpful to see the equipment, layout, and process. We got to check out their mushroom yard and see where and how they have their logs set up. Getting a chance to drill holes, put spawn into the holes, and then wax the holes was awkward but great! We certainly have a lot to learn, but that is true of everything!

My partner using an adapted angle grinder to drill holes into the oak bolts. The bolts are then stacked while they wait to be inoculated.

I’m using a thumb injector to put the sawdust spawn into the logs (L). On the right, food-grade wax is heated to a sizzle on a hot plate. It is brushed over the inoculated holes to keep them sealed until the log is flushed (submerged in cold water) next year to induce fruiting.

After drilling, inoculating, and waxing, the bolts go on to the fork to be put in the mushroom yard. These will fruit next year. They are marked with a colored nail so that the everyone knows which year they were inoculated. Bolts can fruit for about 3–4 years.

Where?

We plan to start inoculating our bolts as soon as they arrive. We will inoculate outside of our barn where we have electricity, and we will most likely put our yard in the woods closest to our barn. The reason we are going to do this location vs. the woods at the far corner of our property is proximity to electricity and water. Each week during the fruiting months, we will have to flush about 40 bolts in water for about 24 hours. Each week we will need a ton of fresh water for flushing. Being close to the barn is ideal because we plan to build a rain water catchment system on it. And if that doesn’t happen before we start flushing, we can grab water from the well system (the barn is plumbed to this). We are learning as we go, so if we determine that this isn’t the ideal location, we will move bolts.

Just like everything on our farm, this is an experiment and we are constantly learning. Knowing that we have a mentor and a group of other growers to hold us up should we encounter issues we can’t solve ourselves makes us feel more confident!