first born!

First born Shiitake from  plugs set in June 2009. Should it take this long? Well it did and it's a joy to see.
The bamboo across the logs keep the plastic cover a bit above. The logs are laying on a moss table I made years ago. Steel frame and a concrete top recessed like a large tray filled with wet peet. It works!

A little conversation on the left

about the second flush of Shiitake. Those two on the left were beautiful and delicious.

This is very satisfying for me to see. What a birthday cake!!! This was taken yesterday and now many of the shiitake are on a drying rack which is shown above the cake. It's known that dried upside down in the sun increases the health benefits dramatically. How much exactly? Very dramatically........

Shiitake

Shiitake wow I finally am growing them. Rita got me the plugs for my birthday and they arived . The logs we found cut on the side of the road last winter ready for the chipper. I knew enough to grab them early as they need to dry out a bit. That was feburary and it's June now . The logs are ready and I drilled holes in them acording to the instructions that arived with the "plug spawn" , ohoo all these new terms. This link is where mine came from, www.fungi.com also

you'l need cheese wax at www.cheesemaking.com and proably other sources.

Next the cheese wax gets dbl.boiler melted to pour or as I did dribble with a paintbrush over the spaun plugs and the ends of the logs. this keeps competing fungi from the shiitake and keeps moisture in.

The image above is of the logs in a shady, moist and foliage over top kind of place.

Who knows if it will work but you can't successfully fail if you dont try! Now I just have to foreget all about them for 6-9 months unless it becomes dry and they'l need a sprinkle of water.