Grow your own mushroom kit instructions

Growing

6 Feb

Here you’ll find basic guidelines for growing and harvesting your very own mushrooms and some variety specific tips for our indoor growing kits. Before we send you your kit, we sourced the best quality and freshest spawn and selected the most suitable substrate for your chosen mushroom. We then prepare and care for it until it’s ready to grow.

We’ve taken the difficult bits out of growing mushrooms. We regard all our kits as beginner level. So, there’s nothing to fear in trying for yourself. It really is as simple as open-water-grow.

When you receive your kit and open it, you’ll see that the substrate block is covered in mycelium. Each mushroom variety looks slightly different. Some differences include -The Pink Oyster mushroom kit has a pink hue to the mycelial growth, the Shiitake will be at a stage called popcorning-where the fruits can be seen to be popping from the substrate block, the Lions Mane kit has very fine hyphae so the growth may not be seen as clearly as with the Oyster kits and the Yellow Oyster mushroom mycelium smells delicately floral with pale yellow bubbly growth starting to form pins-which will grow into your mushrooms.

Getting started

With all our kits you’ll get a full set of instructions. Please open the kit as stated in the instructions. These will differ for each type of mushroom, for example, the Shiitake block will need to be removed entirely from its grow bag to allow the fruit to grow all over the kit. The Lion’s Mane and King Oyster will be instructed to fruit from the top of the kit, and the Oysters all grow from an ‘X’ shaped opening cut into the front of the grow bag.

A substrate block for mushroom growing with an X drawn on it

A substrate block used for mushroom growing with a hessian bag and scissors.

A prepped mushroom growing kit with googly eyes on it and a branded Caley Brothers sign next to it

We put all our kits in jute sacks; this helps block out the light whilst they are waiting to be fruited. All our kits are recommended to be grown in a room with enough light that you can read a book by during the day. Because mushrooms don’t photosynthesis the light doesn’t need to be natural, they’ll get all their nutrition from the substrate block, and will just use the light to initiate growth. In our commercial grow rooms, we use artificial light to help our mushrooms to grow.

Watering

Regular watering of your mushrooms is important. Mushrooms appear in the wild after a period of rainfall, and humidity levels can affect their growth. If you under water your kit either the substrate or the mushrooms will dry out and not grow well or at all. If you over water your kit, or water begins to pool within the bag, you could encourage mould to take over.

The recommended way to water your kit is to invest in a mister. This will give your kit an even and light spray, tap water is ideal.

Do not leave any standing water on the top of your kit if it is a top fruiting variety, similarly with the Shiitake kits, don’t let it sit in a puddle of old water. Simply tip away any water that collects.

A Caley Brothers mushroom kit being watered with a water bottle

A Caley Brothers Mushroom kit, outside with sun glasses on, being watered out of a water bottle

A Caley Brothers mushroom kits being watered by a young boy with a pippette

Hygiene

When growing mushrooms, you are creating an ideal environment for all kinds of bacteria to grow, providing warmth, a food source and moisture. So, with handling of our kits, especially the book kit, coffee kit or even when cutting openings in your grow bag - clean hands, clean scissors, and clean utensils is vital. This is to reduce the risk of contamination of your substrate and your mycelium not growing well. Our aim is good healthy mycelium, growing and consuming the substrate, so you can get an excellent crop of mushrooms from your kit.

Temperature stability

If your kit is placed to grow in a spot that has huge swings of high to low temperatures this can create issues with moulds growing. You can help avoid this by keeping your kit away from direct sunlight and any sources of heat like a radiator or boiler cupboards.

With our coffee kits and our book kits, we recommend storing your kit in a kitchen food cupboard for the incubation stage.

Lion’s Mane

The Lion’s Mane mushroom is particular about where they are situated. They don’t like a breeze, as this can cause the growing mushroom to go solid and turn brown. We find standing an open book in front of the growing kit can be enough to stop any breeze if a better spot cannot be found. The mushroom also doesn’t enjoy being sprayed directly - we encourage you to spray the inside surface of the open grow bag. This helps keep the atmosphere surrounding the growing mushroom humid.

So, find a spot away from moving air, spray a light mist of water into the bag, avoiding the growing mushroom and you’ll have a stunning mushroom in just a couple of weeks.

NB. In our aim to reduce plastic and simplify the growing process, we have recently updated our Lion’s Mane instructions. If you have received different instruction with your kit these too are still relevant and will give you a good harvest. Please email us if you have any queries and we can help you directly enquiries@caleybrothers.co.uk

Storage

Our Pink Oyster mushroom kits must be started immediately. They don’t like to hang around and the spawn can’t be chilled below 8 degrees as it’ll cause it to perish, so get growing straight away.

All our other kits can be stored in a fridge for a short period of time before being grown – always read the packaging and instructions for guidance and storage advise.

By keeping your kit chilled, this slows the growth of the myceliam and delays any mushrooms from growing. However, if left too long your mushrooms may begin to grow without any intervention at all. Such is the way when working with living products, sometimes despite all our efforts we can’t stop them from getting growing.

Harvesting

Once your mushrooms have grown to a good size, when the caps have flattening out and are ready to harvest, remove all mushrooms at once. If you harvest a few at a time, the rest of the mushrooms will begin to wither and won’t grow more.

After you have harvested your crop, consider trying for another flush. If your keen to try again, you’ll want to rest your kit in a clean, dark space with a steady temperature for ten days. Once the mycelium has had a chance to grow again you can try for a second crop.

The substrate block at this point is more susceptible to contamination, so do be mindful of clean hands when handling your kit and look out for green spots appearing. After 7-10 days soak and water your kit, the second harvest will take longer to appear than the first.

Fully grown yellow oyster mushrooms by Caley Brothers

Oyster mushrooms growing out of a bare substrate block

A women holding a Caley Brothers Grey Oyster mushroom growing kit

Once finished

Once your kit has finished growing you can bury it in your garden or in a large plant pot, or you could break it up and scatter it over your garden, flowerpots, or compost. The rest of the packaging can be recycled.

With some mushrooms you may find you spot them growing outside, this is because the mycelium within your used kit has had a chance to grow and gather more nutrients and fruited when the conditions have allowed.

Please do not pick or consume any mushroom that has not been expertly identified.

Our passion is to get everyone growing, if you receive your kit and you don’t feel it is in the best health, do get in contact. Please make sure you read all instruction so you can store and care for it correctly. Most of all we love to guide everyone on their growing journey, we’re always available to answer any questions you may have.

And always get in touch and show us your mushrooms!

Mush Love x