FAQs

Please see our grow kit instruction here.

Spawn is alive!  We start spawn from petri dishes and then move it to grain and finally sawdust for the outdoor species.  The whole process can take up to 3 months for certain species!  We don’t carry inventory as we want to ensure you get healthy spawn that is actively growing.  That way, once you receive your order, you can use it right away or put it in the fridge (a clean fridge!) for about four to six weeks.

Yes. We provide discounts for orders of 10kg or more of grain spawn (of the same species). Wholesale prices are here: https://shop.fungiakuafo.com/collections/grain-spawn-wholesale

Our cultivated mushroom spawn is from edible mushroom strains.  They do have to be cooked!  Please don’t eat the mushrooms raw.  Our mushrooms were cultivated from wild strains but have been selected over time to produce lots of fruiting bodies.

If you are growing mushrooms outdoors and have added sawdust spawn to another substrate like wood chips or straw, you DO need to ensure the mushrooms growing are what you expect.  Lots of wild fungi can colonize your wood chips or straw too!

Medicinal mushrooms, such as Reishi and Turkey Tail, are made into tinctures or extracts.  There are lots of resources out there on medicinal mushrooms – check out an Albertan, Robert Rogers and his book The Fungal Pharmacy: https://selfhealdistributing.com/

This website http://mushroomexpert.com/ has lists of most mushrooms and information on how to identify them.

In Alberta, The Alberta Mycological Society is able to help identity mushrooms in the province: https://www.albertamushrooms.ca/

This is the taxonomic kingdom. It’s how scientists organize all living organisms on our planet.

Fruiting body

This is what we eat. The function of the fruiting body is to produce spores for sexual reproduction.  This is why we say “fruit” mushrooms!

Mycelium

Most fungi only exist in mycelial form.  Only a few produce fruiting bodies, and of those only a few are enjoyable to eat! Mycelium is typically white and it’s what you’ll see covering the sawdust, grain or straw that you purchase. If you dig in your garden or in a pile of wood chips, you will often see white strands. These are usually wild mycelium colonizing the soil or chips.

Mycology

Mycology is the study of fungi.

Maybe! Our goal is to work with farmers (rural and urban), permaculture designers, health practitioners, restoration ecologists, environmentalist and anyone interested in growing fungi to make the process of integrating fungi into our food systems, and ecological practices more accessible.  Please email us with your interests and we can work together to make it happen.

If you are using sterilized substrates (such as sterilized sawdust), you need about 5% grain to 95% sterilized sawdust.

If you are using pasteurized substrates (such as straw or un-nutrified sawdust), you need about 15%-20% grain to 80%-85% substrate.

This can be quite variable but typically, with two flushes, you should get 500g of mushrooms per grow kit (1.5kg of sterilized hardwood sawdust supplemented with bran).

This is species dependent…  Please check our library for more ideas!

Some substrates: hardwood sawdust, straw, cardboard, and coffee.

Indoor growing methods:

• sterilized nutrified sawdust – grow straight from the bag (all species)
• un-untrified sawdust – grow in buckets (blue oyster, pearl oyster, and yellow oyster)
• pasteurized straw – grow in tubes
• coffee – grow straight from the bag

Outdoor growing methods:

• Stacks (Blue Oyster, Pearl Oyster)
• Plugs (Shiitake)
• Garden Beds (Wine Caps, Blue Oyster, Pearl Oyster)
• Heaps (Shaggy Mane)

Check the library for ideas!

There is more information about stacks in our library here.  Generally speaking, May is a great time to inoculate logs outside in Alberta!  A bit earlier in warmer provinces.

Sawdust spawn can be used to fruit mushrooms straight from the bag or for outdoor projects.

Grain spawn is used to inoculate other substrates like sawdust, coffee and cardboard.  Check out the library for other ideas.

Note: Shaggy Mane and Wine Cap will NOT fruit from the bag.  They must be used for outdoor projects.

You can keep spawn in the fridge for about four to six weeks. (Ensure it is kept clean!)  After that, the quality of the spawn degrades and it slowly dies.

Here’s a link to our ourdoor growing spawn: https://shop.fungiakuafo.com/collections/outdoor-growing

Here’s a link to our grain spawn: https://shop.fungiakuafo.com/collections/grain-spawn

This website http://mushroomexpert.com/ has lists of most mushrooms and information on how to identify them.

In Alberta, The Alberta Mycological Society is able to help identity mushrooms in the province: https://www.albertamushrooms.ca/  

Please order at least 8 weeks before you wish to start your outdoor projects.  Spring comes in different months across Canada!  We ship our outdoor species from March to June each year (you choose your ship month when ordering).