November 13, Grain Inoculation

This meeting was spent signing a few papers and working in the lab and I worked with Sarah.  I now have my own Ecovative email and crocs to use in the lab. :)

In the lab, we focused on transferring the mycelium on the agar culture I created the previous week onto grain cultures.  I learned that using grain cultures is one of the most efficient ways for spawning.  Each individual grain provides more surface area for mycelium to grow on as well as provide nutrition.  Therefore, you can mass produce mycelium spawn.

Sarah and I used liquid inoculation techniques to transfer the mycelium.  This is a method where you combine  fragmented mushroom mycelium (agar mycelium broken down with blender) with sterile water.  That way when you pour this mixture into the grain, mycelium fragments are more evenly distributed.  Like all things concerning mushroom growth, contamination prevention was important.  Once again, I worked on my lab skills and being aware of contamination.  When the transfer was finished, we put the spawn to incubation.

Afterwards, Sarah briefly showed me the project she is currently working on.  She is trying to create a product that is a raise-it-yourself mushroom kit that uses old coffee grounds.