Monday, May 18, 2020

Propagating mycorrhizal fungi!

Yay!  I found out how to propagate my own fungi (since it's so darned expensive).  The instructions are at https://moldresistantstrains.com/diy-how-to-make-mycorrhizal-fungi-inoculant/

On May 6th, I sprouted some hard wheat in a jar, and once there were root tails (May 8th), I planted them in 50% vermiculite and 50% compost.


Now look at them!  May 18th.

It's now cat grass for my kitties, which doubles their usefulness.  Actually, I saved about 1/3 of the sprouted wheat to make Rejuvelac, so that's triple-usage!!

Sadly, I put the pot in the skylight for the first day and a half, and they got baked to about 90 degrees F, so I might've killed the fungi.  I'm afraid to look.  Maybe I should look.

In 4 months, the fungi should be just sporulating, but that's a known timeframe for Bahia grass seed.  Not sure what the time frame is for hard wheat.  Yeah, I'd better look.

I just gotta test for the unwanted kind of fungi (tricoderma) before I harvest it all and use it.

Update 6/4/2020:  There are no fungal hyphae.  I don't think this worked.  Either I killed it all when I put the pot in the 95 degree skylight shelf for a day, or wheat grass isn't ideal, or something.  Maybe the store-bought starter inoculant is bogus, which would piss me off, because it's expensive.  
I might retry by following the exact directions so that I can see what success looks like before trying to modify instructions.


Update 6/29/2020:  Well, the grass is dying, and there's still no hyphae.  Wheat grass is too short-lived to reach the 4 month growth period.  Also, why would you use only one kind of seed?  What if it only forms relationships with one kind of mycorrhizal fungi?  I think the best would be using multiple kinds of seeds.

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