Hullo chums! We get asked “what are the simplest ways you can improve your mycology techniques” quite a bit, because people obviously wanna get the most bang for their buck. Ace, we love the question (it’s lovely to see people wanting to learn more), but we thought this might also help, so have a look - this is what we reckon are hands-down the most important things to think about when you’re growing mushrooms!

Read. Or watch stuff. About mycology.

Put subtitles on so you can read and watch if you like. This is a hobby that has a low barrier to entry, but a very high skill ceiling. At probably the simplest end, you can have gambler’s success banging spores into bags of microwave rice, but you can also learn how to make your processes absolutely foolproof and guarantee success even from your failures.

We’re at a really interesting period in mycology, where successful techniques can be essentially peer-reviewed by anyone around the world, and iterated upon until we know exactly how it works, why it works, and how to repeat it. Interestingly, this is where the whole Uncle Ben’s thing came from - those bags of rice have been around for ages but it wasn’t until around 2018 that people realised that you could learn to grow mushrooms on them. There’s even a popular subreddit about the tek.

The point being: there is so much decent and tested information out there across relevant forums, Reddit, and Youtube (or even in our product guides) that you could learn how to do virtually everything in mycology without leaving your couch (even where the illusive libs are found!). The knowledge and techniques that have been developed by people far cleverer than us at MycoPunks are just sitting there waiting to be watched at your convenience, for no money. Yeah, the internet’s done some bad shit to humanity as well, but also the ability to find resources on anything that interests you is pretty sweet.

We have a YouTube channel with some nice videos too.

Make a SAB

Get box, cut box, flip box, work in box. We go on about this particular bit of kit a lot, because it will cost you about a tenner to make your own, tops, and it will up your chances of success by far more than a tenner deserves to. This will improve what you’re doing at the start by a million billion percent, and it’s also a good lesson in thinking logically about the likely problem points in trying to stop contaminants shitting all over your hard work.

Once more in case you haven’t read it before: go to your local supermarket. Buy a big, tall, clear plastic box. One with a lid is even better as you can use that as your floor. Ideally the lid is smooth on the inside, as it’s easier to clean. Now you need to make two holes in the side, so that you can fit your hands and forearms in, without them scraping along the edges (so that you don’t scrape particles off your clothes or skin). The best way to do this is by burning a hole through, using a large metal ring (empty catering-sized beans tin, pan lid, I’m sure you can work this out), although you can use a knife or scissors or lasers if you’d prefer. Put the box upside down so that your lid is your floor, and congrats: you have now made something that dust can’t float into.

Our good pal,  Clyde from Orangutan Trading Co made a handy guide on how to make your own SAB here.

Accept failure so you can learn to avoid it

We’re not going to get all ‘namaste’ on ya, don’t worry. Things can, and will, go wrong when you’re trying to grow mushrooms. Unsurprisingly, because we work at a mushroom company, we have all the kit you can see in our shop and things can still go wrong for us sometimes when we’re cultivating at home.

When you’re trying to grow mushrooms in your house, you’re trying to replicate naturally occurring environments that are suitable for mushrooms to grow, but inside, with a life form that shares a chosen food source with the various invisible bastards that live in our houses and are quicker growing than our chosen life form. The invisible bastards also hitch a lift on things that float, did we mention that? And speaking of things that zoom through the air, there are actual flies that like to eat your substrate too because you fuck you, that’s why. Despite this, loads of us manage to grow mushrooms at home, whenever we like. That’s because, grasshopper, the only real failure is not learning from what went wrong. If you don't know what wrong looks like, then how can you ever avoid it?

Every time something fucks up, it’s an opportunity to (mentally, if you like, but we actually do it on paper) list out the steps in your process, and where it could’ve gone wrong. Did your SAB lift up? Did your flatmate come into the house, opening all the doors and wafting the air about? Did you forget to wipe something? Are your temperatures correct? There’s likely a list the size of your arm of steps that you took to start growing mushrooms, so have a think, try again, and make sure that every time you do it just a percent better.

Experiment

Everything works the way it works because it’s always worked like that, right? Fuuuuuuck that. Here’s what you do: learn the basics, please. Don’t try to reinvent the wheel before you know what a wheel is or how to make one. But once you’ve got that sussed out, go wild.

Like we said before, people didn’t know about how much of a friend to us Uncle Ben truly was until a few years ago. The guys that used to try and grow psychedelic mushrooms back in the 70’s had no fucking clue what they were doing compared to today, because they were having to make it up as they went along and find out what worked. If you look at Psilocybin: Magic Mushroom Grower’s Guide, written by Terrance McKenna and his partner Kat Harrison (using pseudonyms) way back in 1976, the methods are inefficient, and hugely fussy, as you’d expect from someone working out a new way of doing things, and the most important thing is that A) it worked, and B) people could tweak the methodology as they became familiar with the principles. Terrence wasn’t wrong in the context of his time, but people have been able to build upon his successes and make the processes even better, and that, my friends, is what it’s all about!

It’s similar for gourmet mushrooms, except obviously the experimentation is considerably easier as large commercial mushroom operations will naturally seek to refine processes to ensure maximum return on their investment.

This could be you! Nothing should be sacred, so once you know the principles of what it is that you’re doing, muck around a bit. If you find what you think is a cool new thing, ask other people to try it out too and see if your results are consistently repeatable - you might be on to something.

Help people

This ties into the experiment part quite well - we’re big believers in the strengths of diversity and inclusivity, and these things also apply here. Someone else may have knowledge, equipment, or skills that could help you to further your own practice, and you might have knowledge, equipment, or skills to help others. When we collaborate and share all of that, we all get better at growing mushrooms!

We actually set up a pretty friendly Discord community where people can share their cultivation tips and help to troubleshoot stuff (and alright, yeah we also do some exclusive discounts over there), so if that sounds like something you’d find useful, click these words here for it to become a reality!

Don’t be afraid to ask questions

This one can be easier said than done, for sure. When we first started off there were a few forums we read which, although helpful in terms of knowledge base, weren’t the most inviting to newcomers. They’d heard it all before, and if you weren’t searching through the threads yourself then you’d get short shrift. This approach works well for a specific type of person (ADHD crew represent), but not for a whole other section of people, and if you’re new, you might not even know where to look to find the answers yourself. That’s partly why we set up the Discord - yes, you are going to ask the same questions that other people have done, but the people in there are cool and will happily answer it or signpost you to the right resources.

You can never be too clean

This is always a bit of an awkward one, because we’re not calling anyone dirty like we were a schoolground bully, but we are all inherently dirty, as we should be. Life is dirty: let’s run it back around again to invisible bastards. Contaminants are everywhere in your house. On your skin, your breath, your furniture, in the air even, cruising through the skies like little green Valkyries, waiting to carry your grow off to Hel (they don’t get to go to Valhalla if they get trich or fungus gnats, we don’t make the rules). You’re shedding hair and skin and every time you sit down on your couch you’re firing off invisible clouds of what used to be you, anyone else who ever sat there, and your pets. Every single fart. God forbid you’ve fucked on it at any point.

Clean clothes that haven’t been outside, a shower, minimised air currents, no pets in the room, not a fuckin’ bathroom (full of mould spores already), not a carpet - there are a lot of ways you can up your odds. You can’t ever eliminate all of the contaminants, but you can reduce the amount of them that are floating about near your working area. It’s basically risk assessment: what are the issues, and if you can’t eliminate them, how do you mitigate them?

So there ya have it - that’s what we reckon are the seven best practices for you to rapidly improve your game. Give it a whirl, and let us know what you think!