Whether you're a beginner or seasoned mushroom grower, mastering the basics ensures confidence and success. In this guide, we'll focus on three easy-to-grow mushrooms: Wine Cap, Shiitake, and Blue Oyster. From indoor growing to garden cultivation, these varieties offer simplicity and delicious rewards for all skill levels. Let's dive in and unleash the potential of your mushroom-growing journey!
1. Wine Cap mushrooms in garden beds or mulch
Wine Cap (Stropharia rugosoannulata) may just be the easiest mushroom to grow at home. They are perfect for those without access to fresh logs or indoor space. They grow best in garden beds made of straw (not hay), hardwood chips, or sawdust. They are a vigorous species and can tolerate a range of substrates and particle sizes that includes some softwoods but generally no more than 25% of the total substrate mix (most edible mushroom species prefer hardwood such as maple or oak). Our Wood Lovr hard wood-based sterile substrate is also compatible with Wine Caps and may be a good option if you don't have access to wood chips or sawdust.
Select a shady part of your garden to spread your substrate, topping it with a layer of Wine Cap sawdust spawn, add another layer of substrate and finish with a good soak of water over the entire bed. Wine Cap is perfect for those growers who don't want to wait a year before they start to see mushrooms. If you inoculate a wood chip bed with Wine Cap in the spring, you'll likely have mushrooms popping up by early autumn!
2. Shiitake mushrooms on logs
The preferred method for growing Shiitake mushrooms has not changed much in a few hundred years. The process is relatively simple: drill holes in a freshly cut hardwood log (ideally oak, though beech and some species of maple will suffice), fill the holes with Shiitake sawdust or plug spawn and seal the holes with melted wax. The wonderful thing about mushroom logs is that you will get multiple years worth of edible fungi without having to re-inoculate your logs. On average a mushroom log will produce for 1 year per inch of diameter of the log. Meaning if you inoculated a 5 inch diameter oak log with Shiitake spawn, it will most likely produce for 5 years!
When you're ready to grow Shiitakes on logs, an Outdoor Mushroom Log Kit is the most accessible way to begin your journey. This mushroom grow kit give you all the supplies you need to jump right into having edible mushrooms right in your back yard! For larger projects you will want to use Shiitake sawdust spawn paired with an angle grinder adapter, specialized drill bit, and inoculation tool.
3. Blue Oyster mushrooms in kits, beds, logs, and buckets
North Spore began as an urban mushroom farm growing Blue Oyster mushrooms and ten years later, Oysters are still a cornerstone of our business. They're versatile, delicious, and the easiest mushroom to grow inside your own home! If you're looking for a mushroom growing kit that you can count on to give you fresh mushrooms as soon as possible, then look no further than our Spray & Grow Kits. Each mushroom kit is a block of sawdust that has been colonized by mushroom mycelium. Simply cut a slit in the plastic against the block, spritz it with water every day, and watch mushrooms grow right before your eyes. It's easy, exciting, and you're sure to grow edible mushrooms on your kitchen counter in as little as two weeks. Blue Oyster fruiting blocks work well for those with a grow tent looking to scale up their indoor grows. They can also easily be grown in monotubs with a mix of substrates including our Wood Lovr hardwood mix and Boomr Bag manure-based substrates.
Blue oyster mushrooms are versatile both indoors and out. They can be grown in garden beds as you would grow Wine Cap mushrooms using either grain or sawdust spawn. They can also be grown on logs using plug spawn and on pillars and stumps using sawdust spawn. Blue Oyster grain and sawdust spawn can be combined with straw and grown outdoors in buckets and other containers as well. The possibilities are nearly endless and as you plan and create your mushroom projects this year, contact us for any questions and troubleshooting. As always, we love to see how your grows go!