Mushroom growth effect by fertilizer 6 th Grade

[Mushroom]

I attempted to post this After Christmas but it didn't make it for some reason and
couldn't get on until now. Thought I'd have answers and beable to start it before Holiday ended.
6 th Grade Science Fair Project due Jan 24
Can a mushroom block continue to produce new flushes of mushrooms over a longer total life
span if the block is lightly fertilized.
How would I do an exp on this? I think there is time as mushrooms grow supper fast.
Where would I get mushrooms for the expermint? In San Francsico: East Bay?
I've looked at libary and this website and other websites no clue how to start or do it.

[ChrisG]

Hi,
To finish this project before Jan 24, you would probably have to order pre-innoculated mushroom kits right away. It would take too long to start from scratch. Kits can be ordered & shipped from Fungi Perfecti in Washington:
http://www.fungi.com/kits/indoor.html
I'd recommend working with oyster mushrooms (Pleurotus) because they grow quickly and fruit easily.
If you are going to make fertilized and unfertilized treatments (or even replicates of each treatment), you will need 2+ kits, which starts to get expensive. You could try to break a large kit into several smaller blocks, but I'm not sure whether that would disrupt the fruiting. If you explain to the folks at Fungi Perfecti that you are working on a science fair project, they might be helpful.

The SF mycological society will also be a helpful resource:
http://www.mssf.org/

Good luck!

[Mushroom]

Bay Leaf an East Bay plant assn told me to go to a grocery store in Bekeley and buy mushrooms there. To my Surprise, they have block of mushrooms.
Will these grow new flutes?
since they have been cut out of the soil, in refer and now on cold chilled store shelf? Which spieces should I get?
I went to the store: Attached blocks BUNA SHIMEJI brown Beech $1.99 pound
and ALBA POPPLIN $11.99 pound
Plan to put in sawdust and dirt.
Teacher said 4 trays so about 30 - 40 mushrroms. Fair Jan 24
Teacher said 2 oz of different fertilizer in 3 trays 1 control tray no fertilizer.
Dad says $25 - $30 to much unless he really has to get the Alba Popplin so I can do
this experiment.
They only had single oyster mushrooms and I know they won't grow.

[ChrisG]

When you say a "block", do you mean a bunch of mushrooms that are attached at the base, or do you mean a block of wood or sawdust that is colonized with fungus (not mushrooms, but smooth white "mycelium")? If these are mushrooms attached at the base, then I doubt they will continue to grow if you plant them in dirt and sawdust. Mushrooms are the fruiting bodies of fungi, which is sort of like a flower on a plant. Yes, you can use flowers to grow a new plant which will then grow more flowers, but you can't just put a flower in the ground and have it grow more flowers. Likewise, if you plant a mushroom, it will usually just turn to goop. If you are very lucky or very careful, the mushroom will colonize the wood/soil and you might get more mushrooms after a few weeks or months.

The usual procedure for growing edible mushrooms is to inoculate a petri dish with tiny bits of mushroom. The plates will grow mycelium, which is how a fungus spends most of its life. Once the plates are well colonized and determined to be free of contaminants, the mycelium is transferred into sterilized grain. Once the grain is colonized by the mycelium, the grain is transferred into a sterilized woody substrate that is selected for that particular species of mushroom (for example, shitake mushrooms are often grown on oak). Once the woody substrate is completely colonized, it is what I've been calling a "block", which can be sold as a "mushroom kit". It looks like this:
http://www.greenlivingnow.com/images/Shiitake-Kit-2.jpg
but without the mushrooms.

To start the mushrooms growing, it sometimes takes a "cold shock" where the block is submerged in ice cold water for a few hours or placed in the refrigerator. Once the mushrooms start growing, they might continue for a week or so and then the block will go dormant. At that point, it is usually thrown away or composted. Sometimes, a second flush will happen if the block is given another cold shock.

There are lots of possibilities for experiments that you could do. I am just not sure about these particular mushrooms that you are seeing at the store. Is this store the Berkeley Bowl?

[Mushroom]

{When you say a "block", do you mean a bunch of mushrooms that are attached at the base,}
This is what the store has and it is what I had orginally thought was a block.

When you first responded I went to the OR website and saw all the different mushroom kits they sold and their block looked like a bee hive hanging in a tree.

I'm still waiting to hear from many other people Lawarence Hall of Science and there are ahalf dozen Grad students at UC Berkeley mushroom lab that I can go see next week. A
trip to east bay this weekend to explore for mushroom and trip next weekend by Willits maybe.
Hopefully, I can get something from the growers in Monterey that grow for grocery stores.

Yes it is Berkeley Bowl. Thank you for your help to me and all the other students

[ChrisG]

You've tapped into some great resources. The UCB students might be a big help. They will be set up for all sorts of growth experiments. You could test your hypotheses for mycelium growing in agar, and you should be able to finish that by the 24th.

Mike Davis' lab at UC Davis does a lot of work with edible mushroom cultivation.
http://plantpathology.ucdavis.edu/peopl ... /Davis.htm
http://plantpathology.ucdavis.edu/resea ... /PLP40.htm
They often have all sorts of mushrooms at various stages of development. That might be another angle to try.

I'm headed to Berkeley Bowl in 5 mins to get some milk and eggs. I'll take a look at the mushrooms.