A Detailed Guide to Mushroom Cultivation Methods and Key Technical Points
Different regions have different names for mushrooms, but the name "mushroom" is fairly widely used. Mushrooms are rich in nutrients, packed with essential amino acids, minerals, vitamins, polysaccharides and other nutritional components, making them a high-protein, low-fat health food. Regularly eating mushrooms can greatly help the body absorb nutrients from other foods. In spring, mushrooms are ideal for replenishing the body's nutrients as part of seasonal health care.
Cultivation Methods
1. Preparing the Mushroom House
When growing mushrooms, you first need to prepare the mushroom house, and the most common type today is a greenhouse structure. The mushroom house is generally built on higher ground, but the site as a whole should be fairly flat, with open surroundings and good ventilation. The greenhouse should be made of a material that diffuses light, and the floor needs to be finished with cement so it can be washed easily. Mushroom beds should be set up inside the house; they can be made of wood, iron, or brick. Finally, windows or roll-up blinds should be left in place to improve ventilation.
2. Composting the Growing Material
Preparing the growing material for mushroom cultivation is also a very important step. The main ingredients are livestock manure, wheat straw, bran, rice straw, corn stalks and so on, and composting usually begins around July. We need to dry the manure in the sun and cut the other materials into pieces, then mix in an appropriate amount of gypsum, soak everything through with water or urine, and pile it up in alternating layers of straw and manure to ferment. Generally, the pile needs to be turned once every three or four days, and after about half a month it is more or less ready.
3. Disinfection and Sterilisation
Once the composting is finished, we first need to thoroughly disinfect and sterilise the mushroom house, then move the growing material into the house and spread it evenly on the mushroom beds. Then close the doors and windows of the house and raise the indoor temperature to around 60 degrees; after three hours, lower the temperature to around 50 degrees and hold it there for a week so the material ferments completely. During this fermentation process, the material is also disinfected and sterilised, so that only beneficial microorganisms remain in it, which is greatly beneficial to mushroom growth.
4. Inoculation and Casing Soil
When the temperature of the growing material drops to around 25 degrees, the mushrooms can be inoculated. We need to level the material on the mushroom beds, with the material on each bed reaching a thickness of about 15 cm. Then inoculate using the hole-planting method, with spacing of about 10 cm between each spot. If you want to speed up colonisation, you can plant the spawn a little more densely. After inoculation, keep the material moist and increase the ventilation of the mushroom house. Finally, cover the material evenly with fine fertile soil and wait for the mycelium to colonise.
5. Managing Fruiting
Fruiting management is the most critical step in mushroom cultivation, as it determines the fruiting performance of the mushrooms, that is, their yield and quality. The most important aspects are water management and temperature management. We need to keep the growing material moist; in the early fruiting stage the humidity is generally around 70 percent, and later it gradually returns to around 80 to 90 percent. When watering, follow the principle of small amounts applied frequently. During colonisation, the temperature in the fruiting house is best kept at around 10 to 18 degrees; during the fruiting stage, raise it to around 20 to 28 degrees, which can speed up fruiting. Once the mushrooms have grown to a certain size, they are ready to harvest.