You want a grow box without Mycelium? Here it is, the Mushbag Rye! This spawn or substrate bag contains 1400cc of sterilized rye grain. The Mushbag contains a heat-treated substrate that’s suitable for the spawn production of most edible and magic mushrooms.
The Mushroom substrate bag is fitted with an air filter and rubber injection port that seals the bag hermetically after injection with a spore or mycelium syringe. Once the rye has been colonized by the mycelium, it can be used for a variety of cultivation methods.
Spores and liquid culture are not included in this grow kit but can be purchased from our spore collection
Contents of the MushBag Rye Mushroom Substrate Kit
- Mushbag with 1400 grams: Sterilized substrate with a moisture content: 60-65%. A mixture of rye, vermiculite, perlite and Gypsum.
Shelf life
- Keep refrigerated. Do not store the Mushbag above a radiator or in the full sun.
- Use within 2 weeks
MushBag Rye Substrate Instructions
Before you start: Clean your work area
- Use soap to clean your hands an a disinfectant to clean your work area. Make sure your work area is clean and sterile, before you lay out all materuals and get strted with the process.
- Make sure there is no draft if you cultivate mushrooms.
- Wash your hands and arms every time before handling the mushroom substrate kit with hand disinfectant or antibacterial soap. As extra protection use disinfected gloves and a face mask.
Let’s get started and do the first step: Inoculate the liquid culture. Liquid Culture consists of a sterilized nutritious solution. This is usually a mixture of water and various kinds of sugars. The mixture has the ability to develop mycelium growth, when inoculated with mushroom spores.
If you want to inject spores from a spore syringe directly into the substrate bag you can skip this step and move on the "Inoculation of the Substrate kit".
Prepare the Liquid Culture
For this step you need a liquid culture vial or make liquid culture yourself. And a mushrooms spores syringe or spore vail.
Wash your hands or use gloves !
- Shake the spore vial or syringe very good to make sure all spores are floating.
- Disinfect the injection site of the liquid culture and the spore vial or syringe with the alcohol swap.
- Inject 2,5 ml of spore solution in the Liquid culture of 10 ml or 5 ml of spore solution on 25ml
Colonizing the Liquid Culture
- Shake the inoculated liquid culture vigorously once a day every day for 10 day
- Shake the inoculated liquid culture vigorously once a day every day for 10 days
- Store the inoculated liquid culture in a place between 23-27 degrees Celsius.
The liquid culture is ready when you see a cloud floating in the suspension. This is mycelium.
Your Liquid culture is ready, It is called the Master Culture, if used and stored properly you can have lots of mycelium from only a tiny bit of spores.
Important! If the liquid is murky, it means there is a contamination and the culture is unusable.
If you don’t use the liquid culture store it in the refrigerator.
Inoculation of the MushBag Rye Substrate
Lay out all the materials you need on a disinfected work space. You will need:
- Mushbag Rye substrate bag
- Mushroom spore syringe or Liquid Culture with germinated mushroom spores
- A lighter or spirit burner
- Alcohol preps
- Disinfectant Spray
Prepare your mushroom spore syringe with 10 ml of spore solution or use the prepared Liquid Culture (10 -25 ml). This is enough spores to inoculate the Mushbag Rye Mushroom substrate.
- Locate the injection port on the substrate bag. Disinfect it with an alcohol swab. Do not touch it again
- Shake the spore syringe very well for 5 till 10 seconds. This will get the spore of the sides and distribute them through the spore solution more evenly.
- Get the syringe and heat the needle, red hot, with a lighter to make it sterile. Let the needle cool off for a few seconds.
- Inject the needle of the syringe into the bag. Add all of the mushroom spore solution in the substrate kit. If the flow blocks ,gently pull the needle back a bit.
- Carefully squeeze and shake the bag to to spread the spore suspension through the substrate.
- Store the kit in a dark place with a temperature between 23-27 degrees
Colonization of the Mushbag Rye
To let the mycelium grow and colonize the substrate you must keep the MushBag Rye in a dark space with a temperature between 26 -28 degrees Celsius.
Please notice that lower temperatures will stagnate the colonization or prolong the colonization time of the substrate. Temperatures below 15 degrees will stop the mycelium to grow.
After 3-7 days you will see the mycelium starting to grow from the spots were the spores were dropped. The mycelium looks like cotton threads and becomes more stringy while developing and colonizing the mushroom substrate.
During this stage the Mushbag can inflate a bit.
Shaking the bag can accelerate the growth of mycelium. Only do this after you see that mycelium is developed in large parts of the bags. Break it a bit to spread it out and let the mycelium develop further.
It takes 2-4 weeks for the mycelium to colonize the substrate in the box. No empty spots of substrate should be left.
Wait an additional 5-7 days to make sure the inside of the substrate is colonized by the spores too. Now that mushrooms substrate is fully covered by the mycelium the kit is ready to be prepared for fruiting or used as spawn to inoculate more substrate.
Growing from the MushBag Rye
There are many methods to fruit mushrooms from the mushbag rye, the simple way is to open the bag on top. Make a casing layer of vermiculite on top of the substrate surface.
Add some moist to the bag and close it with clothespins or some paper clips. When conditions are right you can have a great yield of mushrooms within weeks.
