The Garden Dirt: Dreams of Mycelium

You've met Thomas. Here's something you might not know about him, he hates mushrooms. Always has. If you feel the same way, he's going to sit next to you and pitch freestyle origami airships at me while I tell you of our Mushroom Saga. I will try not to choke up, for it is a tale of hope and disappointment and more hope, and beeswax.

Last year, around this time, Geza built this stellar box of cow poop.

Think that's gross? Let me tell you a little secret: Everything good comes from poop. The endless flow of matter, through its cycle of growth and decay, is a constant riveting sci-fi romance ambigram, in which poop is the main character.

But, here's what's disappointing about this box of poop: It looked like this a year later.


It was supposed to be overflowing with lots of freaky shaggy mane mushrooms for us to eat! Ouch! Okay, except Thomas. Thomas was not disappointed. If you ask him, this tale of failure is a happy one. Case closed. If you ask me, it did not fruit* because we let it get too dry.

*"To fruit" is what you call making mushrooms. Now, go forth and think of mushrooms as fruit.

I used this kit. I'm sure it's a great kit, with lots of fungal potential, but we screwed it up somehow. In a case such as this, my expert advice, seasoned by years of experience, is to rake it up and use it for something else.

I felt knocked down, humbled, yet ready to give it another go. Most of us still love mushrooms, and to grow mushrooms would at least earn us honorary family membership in some sort of elf or fairy organization, which can't be a bad thing. Even Thomas can get on board with that. We will bring intentional fungus to Backyard University!

Most of the stuff we mail order for the garden comes from one place, Territorial Seed Company, mainly because they're fairly close to us. I ordered a new mushroom kit from them. The log kind this time. What does that mean? The first kit was mycelium* riding on some sawdust. It was supposed to go into the soil and bloom ' shrooms everywhere. You saw how that went. This kit has the mycelium embedded into small wooden dowels, in a corkscrew groove up the side.


*Mycelium is something like roots for a fungus, sort of. It's threadlike and is usually not seen, when there is fruiting fungus about, because it's embedded in some sort of substrate. That means covered in dirt or growing in/consuming a chunk of wood in most cases. In our case, we will be watching for it at the end of the logs. From what I've read, when the ends of your logs turn white, you've got a good mycelium growth going on inside and fruiting is hopefully right around the corner.

After choosing and preparing your log,, these little babies go into the drilled holes.

We went with alder, scavenged by friends, mostly. They break down the fastest, but they're so easy to find around here. I used beeswax to plug up the holes, otherwise the dowels would have slid right out of whichever side of the log faces down. Of course, if you drill a small enough hole, the dowel has to be hammered into place, so sealing isn't considered necessary.

I relied heavily on internet sources for information on how best to do this project. That little pamphlet that came with the kit is infinitely losable. There is abundance of advice on how to select and prepare a log, but, if you ask me, the tricky part is the beeswax. There's very little online about how to seal these holes up. The best advice I came across was, "Try not to start a fire". Will do, but I'd like to go one step better. Due to endless rain, this was happening in our kitchen, so we couldn't go slinging wax about all willy nilly.

I was afraid the wax being too hot might kill some of the fungus on the dowels, so I tried to let softened wax cool a little first by dipping my finger into it (once it's cooled enough to do that without pain). This amount of wax was perfect for closing up one hole. After rolling it off of my finger tip and into a little blob, it was quite easy to press into the space above the dowels. From what I've read, sealing wax will also work for this, but does sealing wax smell like honey? Does it give you many opportunities to say "beeswax", as in "mind your own.."? " Mind your own sealing wax?" There's a reason that never took off as a wildly popular English expression.

The mushroom kit came with three varieties, Pearl Oyster, Shittake, and Reishi.

In order to keep my logs straight, I carved a P, S, R into the sides and dripped wax on them, so that the grooves wouldn't be vulnerable to other, uninvited fungi.

Yes, I know you're a fun guy, but I just don't want you hanging around my Shittake, so beat it.

To seal the ends or not? This is hotly debated by would-be backyard mycologists the world over. Any part of the wood that isn't covered by intact bark or sealing wax is vulnerable to other fungi entry. Since the mycelium we're trying to cultivate needs to be the only fungus eating that log, we have to keep other stuff out. However, the biggest problem with getting mushroom logs to fruit is the log drying out. A log is sort of like a bundle of straws. The ends are where moisture enters and exits most readily. Sealing them up would greatly hinder the logs' ability to deliver moisture to its center. I'm leaving them open for now, and hoping all the other fun guys out there keep their distance.

If you ever decide to grow something in your yard, start with the south side. If you live in the US, that's going to be the the sunniest spot, most of the time. Now, guess where the shadiest spot is? North side! The north side of Backyard University is a shady netherworld, populated by mosses and ferns and occasionally, resentful anemic weeds. In short, prime mushroom garden spot.


This picture fills my heart with optimism. In life, some hopes go unrealized. Some efforts fall short. Perhaps, next year, Thomas' dreams will come true and I'll have to photograph logs that grew nothing but orange slime mold. But if that day comes, I will already have another kit and I will already be on the lookout for more cheap beeswax. For intentional fungi shall come to Backyard University! Our souls are inoculated with spores of hope and it's damp in there.