Mushrooms 101

This one day introductory course is the perfect hands on educational tool to get you started growing your own mushrooms for gourmet or medicinal use in your own home or green house! 

This course touches on the historical as well as the present uses for many types of Fungi, including the importance

of Fungi as a part of the ecosystem, emphasizing some of the more popular mushrooms and the potential they have to alleviate many symptoms of todays common ailments. 

Introduction

- History of Mushrooms

- Importance of mushrooms to our ecosystem

- Mushrooms for medicine

- Beginnings of mushroom cultivation

- Bacterial contamination and sterility techniques

Getting Started - Instructional

- Oyster Mushrooms

-Substrate materials and mix

-Growing conditions

- Shitake Mushrooms

-Substrate materials and mix

-Growing Conditions

Hands on

- Pasteurization technique

- Spawning to Substrate

- Maintenance

- Harvesting

- Storage Techniques 

During the hands on phase of instruction, you will be taken through all of the necessary steps including pasteurization of substrates, Spawning mushroom mycelium to Substrates as well as sterile technique and maintenance of your crop. We will focus on two of the easiest mushrooms to grow in our climate, and you will leave with all the materials you need to start your own mushroom grow this spring.

Taught by one of our experienced instructors with a background in Mycology, whether you are looking for something unique and valuable to offer at the farm market, or simply for your own consumption, you will leave with the skills to begin producing mushrooms grown with your own two hands, from materials easily sourced in our local community.