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What about when they grow in the wild? How does the mushroom avoid the contamination?
 
In a controlled environment, the goal is to be sterile. Obviously in the wild mushrooms are exposed to a variety of harmful/negative stimuli (animals, weather, humans who hunt them, infection/disease etc.)

So to answer your question, they don't necessarily avoid all contamination in nature. The more careful and clean/sterile you are with an indoor grow, the higher your yields and success rate will be.

There are many ways to grow a mushroom but if you are going with a tek that uses jars it is "wise to sterilize." There may be other ways to do it without a pressure cooker but I have not looked into such methods. In my experience, it is nice to have and mine only cost me about $65 or so a few years ago and it still works great!
 
jim2015 said:
What about when they grow in the wild? How does the mushroom avoid the contamination?



That is a truly great question & one that I have pondered for a long, long time....

I hope one (or more) of the great scientific minds here on the nexus could provide us with a good answer to that one jim!

😉
 
jim2015 said:
What about when they grow in the wild? How does the mushroom avoid the contamination?

They might be like us, and suffer in a 'mostly' aseptic environment, without constant low-level immune-system challenges.

The mycelium might also benefit from being rooted in the real Earth, with access to all of its chemical richness, as opposed to a bit of inert substrate in a sealed jar...
 
The reason im asking is that wild is that it is the natural state of a mushroom before people started growing it in jars and boiling them.

Im just wandering why no contamination when its wild but so risky and prone to contamination when its grown indoors with so much precaution.

I saw a video this guy that wiped the jars and everything like 3 times with alcohol and then boiled the jars for 3 hours and even heated up the syringes.

Its just amazing to me that we go to such an extent while the outdoor wild mushrooms do nothing and are just as clean. Just curious thats all.:thumb_up:
 
Hey Jim, welcome:)

You can use the steam sterilization method, all you need is a big pot and something to put on the bottom of the pot to elevate your jars above the water line and so their not sitting on the bottom of the pot, then bring the water to a boil for 90 min with the lid on, make sure you don't run out of water and add some if you have to.

My first grow was using the pf-tek method (actually I still use it). I used this video series as a guide because it covered most of my questions.
its a bit dated and cheesy:p but it helped.
 
jim2015 said:
What about when they grow in the wild? How does the mushroom avoid the contamination?

Wild mushrooms develop anti-microbial compounds in order to compete with other organisms, some of these compounds may even be beneficial for us...

See this quote from wiki in regards to Psilocybe Semilanceata (liberty caps)

When grown in dual culture with other saprobic fungi isolated from the rhizosphere of grasses from its habitat, P. semilanceata significantly suppresses their growth. This antifungal activity, which can be traced at least partly to two phenolic compounds it secretes, helps it compete successfully with other fungal species in the intense competition for nutrients provided by decaying plant matter. Using standard antimicrobial susceptibility tests, Psilocybe semilanceata was shown to strongly inhibit the growth of the human pathogen methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). The source of the antimicrobial activity is unknown

Unfortunately this doesn't mean you can skip sterilization steps in a cubensis homegrow and end up with mushrooms that are extra medicinal :p
 
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