Making a Mushroom Log Overview

Mushrooms are in the fungi kingdom. There are many different types of mushrooms in the world, but 700 are known for their medical use. In this instructable we will show you how to cultivate shiitake mushrooms, one of the most popular medicinal and edible mushrooms. Shiitake can help fight tumors and are a good source of vitamin D and protein. Mushrooms are great for dieters; they are 80-90% water and very low in calories. Mushrooms are fun to grow, however it takes time and concentration. It takes 1 ½-2 ½ months to grow your mushrooms from an agar plate to a mushroom log. There are also frequent losses, regardless of your efforts to sterilize everything. This is because there are a lot of microbial contaminants that if present will compete with the shiitake for the food source you are providing the shiitake. We will show you how to prevent contaminants.

Coming from students this project was fun! People liked taking pictures of everything we did, sanitizing, working in the glove box and the kitchen and many other little details. Shiitake and Oyster mushrooms are the easiest to grow. Oysters are great for beginners, Shiitakes are woodlovers and can grow outdoors in woodchip beds, inoculated logs or indoors on sawdust logs. In this instructable We will show you how to make an indoor Shiitake sawdust log from scratch. This method can be used for different kinds of mushrooms as well.

Each Part in this Guide to making a mushroom log takes place a day to a few weeks apart from each other. Here’s the table of Contents and expected timeline:

Part A: Making a Mushroom log, Sterilizing Grain. Day 1 (2-3 hrs)
Part B: Making a Mushroom log, Transferring Mycelium onto Grain. Day 2 (30 minutes)
Part C and D: Making a Mushroom log, Bulking up Grain Spawn (2-3 weeks later)
Part E: Making a Mushroom log, Transferring Spawn onto fruiting substrate (2-3 weeks later)
Part F: Making a Mushroom log, Harvesting and caring for your finished log