The optimal temperature for shiitake mushrooms to grow is 10-25 degrees Celsius. Chen Chunhua is thankful that it is still 1984. She still vividly remembers the year 2022, when the temperature was over 40 degrees Celsius and she felt breathless even when she went out to look around.
At that time, I thought I might really be old and useless, but now when I think about it, it was just too damn hot!
The temperature in September was still over 30 degrees Celsius, but now it is firmly around 27 or 28 degrees Celsius. If you just put the mushrooms in the basement, you can enjoy a constant temperature of around 20 degrees Celsius.
After being soaked in water, the mushroom wood standing in the basement was hit on the cut surfaces at both ends by Chen Chunhua with a hammer. It is said that this is called "Jingmu".
After the mushroom tree is startled, the excess water in the cracks of the mushroom tree can overflow, adding fresh oxygen, allowing the broken hyphae to thrive and promote the bursting of primordia in large numbers.
Then mushrooms started to grow on almost the fourth day. A week later, Chen Chunhua, wearing a mask and carrying a small basket, clamped the bottom of the mushroom stem with two fingers and gently picked the whole mushroom.
The first yield of the mushroom tree was actually not high, and the mushrooms were very small. Teacher Qian said that this was normal, so Chen Chunhua did not plan to sell this batch of mushrooms. To put it bluntly, such a small amount could not be sold at all.
Anyway, I promised Liang Shengdi that I would use it to make chicken soup, so I might as well take it home and eat it myself!
However, this trial cultivation proved that she could still grow shiitake mushrooms. Hehe, the night school tuition and magazine subscription were not in vain.
She thought the mushrooms on the willow trees grew better than those on the fir trees. After Mrs. Liang finished eating the chicken, she persuaded her to take her to pick up a few more willow logs. If that was not enough, she could ask someone to help cut down two more trees.
These four pieces of mushroom wood need to be placed in a ventilated place to rest for a period of time to grow the fungi and continue to serve her in winter.
Another one is Agaricus bisporus, also known as white mushroom.
Because Chen Chunhua likes to eat this kind of mushroom very much, she started to tinker with it after reading a cultivation experiment published by others.
She asked for a mushroom bed according to the picture in the book. The bed had four layers, and she asked Lin Guoqing to help her get it. Due to his failure in choosing wood, Lin Guoqing invested a lot of money in a steel-structured mushroom bed this time.
The pine wood crossbars are covered with bamboo boards, and the edge of the material is five centimeters high. The posture is very professional, and even Lao Shi was stunned.
"Why does your wife ask for wood one moment and shelves the next? Are you...going to open a small shop?"
"Go away, this is a mushroom bed! My wife wants to be the mushroom king!"
She separated this mushroom bed from other mushroom racks by building a brick wall, making it a separate room with a door and windows, which is very bright.
The compost needed cow dung, so Chen Chunhua carried chicken and duck manure from the chicken coop to exchange with others. She also needed straw, wheat bran, corn cobs, urea, gypsum, ammonium carbonate, lime, sesame oil cake, superphosphate and other things.
When I reported this to Lin Guoqing, he was stunned. Are you growing mushrooms or doing an experiment? Why do you need so many things?
Chen Chunhua spread her hands and said, "I don't know either. This is what is written in the article."
In fact, what Mr. Qian meant was that most of the substrates for edible fungi cultivation are limited to the following: wood chips, straw, corn cobs, etc. However, if you want to cultivate on a large scale, you will definitely need nutrients. He also suggested that you look at other people's experiences for these.
So Chen Chunhua just followed suit. She would do whatever people wrote in their shared experiences. After she gained some experience, she could make adjustments herself, right?
Her family has become a major consumer of rice straw and wheat bran in Sihe Village. The chicken coop and mushroom house both need a lot of these things. The villagers keep what they need and sell it all to Chen Chunhua. But even that is not enough, so they have to go out and buy more.
Of course, the chicken, duck, and goose manure in the chicken coop are also provided to everyone. These are all good things for fertilizing the fields! Since the land was distributed to households, no one has used the public toilets. People don’t want their own fertilizer and water to flow into other people’s fields!
Lin Guoqing said it was troublesome, but he was very efficient in helping her find things. If he couldn't find it, he would ask Ma Dexiang, Ye Juncai, Shi Zhiqiang, and even Hu Limin. They were all brothers, so if there was anything, just say a word and anyone who could help would lend a hand.
Not long after the shiitake mushrooms were planted, all the necessary materials for growing Agaricus bisporus were ready.
The rice straw is crushed and soaked in water with wheat bran and mixed into a pile. The next day, you can still squeeze out water when you squeeze it with your hands. Then it is mixed with dried and crushed cow dung and sesame oil cakes, and then poured with ammonium carbonate water and clean water.
In fact, what Chen Chunhua hates most is the percentages written in articles like this. What does 60% water content mean? Where does she measure the water content?
So 60% is more than half, does that mean it needs more water? If you can feel water seeping out when you pinch the mixture, is that enough?
After the manure is pre-wetted, spread a thick layer of straw on the ground, then a layer of cow dung, then straw again, and then cow dung again. When spreading, you have to put the straw in a circle around it and put wheat straw in the middle to prevent the straw from rotting too quickly.
Urea and human fertilizer water should also be sprinkled layer by layer, with less watering on the lower layer and more watering on the upper layer. Six layers of grass and manure should be spread respectively, and the top layer should be sealed with pre-wetted manure.
It happened to be the weekend when the materials were piled up, and the two children at home came to watch the fun. Lin Shuchao covered his nose and said, "Growing these mushrooms is no different from eating shit. He would never eat it!"
Liang Shengdi then wrote it down in her notebook, "You said it yourself, don't forget it when the time comes!"
Five days later, when the material was turned over, it smelled even worse. Chen Chunhua held her breath and shoveled it hard, adding gypsum, superphosphate, and an appropriate amount of water as she turned it over. After turning it over, she developed obsessive-compulsive disorder and built a small cube like building a wall.
Five days later, it was Lin Guoqing who came to turn the material. Chen Chunhua instructed him to add plaster while turning it.
"Isn't it said to be smelly? I think it's okay."
"It's almost fermented, so of course it's not that smelly!"
This time, it takes another four days to turn it over, add lime, and then ferment for another two days before this step is completed.
After helping out in the mushroom house from time to time, Lin Guoqing came to the conclusion that growing mushrooms is no easier than raising chickens.
In the middle of summer, I have to turn over all kinds of shit and wait step by step. It is really not as fulfilling as touching eggs every day.
Two days later, the room where the Agaricus bisporus mushroom beds were isolated was sprayed and disinfected with copper sulfate solution by Chen Chunhua, and 0.2% dichlorvos was also sprayed around the manure.
Seal the pile with plastic film to kill insects. The next day, close all ventilation windows and exhaust pipes in the room. Quickly move the compost into the single room and fill the mushroom beds, filling all four beds from top to bottom. Once filled, close the door immediately to prevent heat loss.
She couldn't control the water content or pH value. Anyway, the material looked light brown as described in the article, so it should be about right.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
