Growing Shiitake Mushrooms at Home

I wish I was talking about the roses blooming in our garden right now, but we’re still a ways off from that, even though they look ready to burst into leaf any second. In the meantime, I’d like to share how we got our shiitake mushrooms started just in case some of you are interested in trying it, too, because now is the time. I mean, I don’t know what it’s like in your area, but mushrooms–groceries in general–are ridiculously expensive here. Back in this kitchen garden post I’d mentioned how I’d like to start growing shiitakes. They run about $1/each at our local market and we cook with them frequently so growing them ourselves would be a huge money saver.

Various mushrooms require different growing substrates and some are easier to grow at home than others. My understanding is that shiitake mushrooms are pretty straightforward and as for substrate have a preference for white oak. If you check your local Craig’s List, you can often find people who are selling logs just for this purpose. You might also try reaching out to a tree trimming business if you’re hitting a wall with Craig’s List. The main thing is you want fresh logs and it’s best if they’re cut while the tree is still in dormancy. In our case, we lucked out because our neighbor was taking down a huge white oak tree and offered us logs.

Size-wise, you want logs that are about 3-8 inches in diameter and about 4-5 feet long but of course, you can play around with this. A 4-5 foot log is pretty heavy so you might be better off with something half that length if you’re going to be moving it around yourself. The main thing you’re looking for is a fairly even ratio of sapwood to heartwood. As the tree grows, the sapwood decreases in comparison to the heartwood so using logs with a smaller diameter is better. Some of our logs were smaller and some were larger. We took what we could get (it was free, after all!) and just went for it. After giving the logs a few weeks “rest” period, important because it allows the wood’s antifungal properties to dissipate, we were ready to inoculate with spawn.

Using a 8.5mm drill bit with stop, Jesse and I drilled a diamond pattern with each hole spaced about 3 inches apart. With a rubber mallet, I knocked in the shiitake plugs until they were flush with the bark and then we covered over the plug with soft wax to help prevent the plugs from drying out. We inoculated 28 logs with about 1,000 plugs. (A couple of the inoculated logs we gave to our log donor as a thank you.) It’s been mushroom madness over here. My whole body is sore and I am seeing tiny fungi in my dreams.

To keep our logs fairly damp, they were laid flat on a very thick layer of leaf mould and I’ll probably mound up more around the sides when I get another delivery in May. Some folks like to prop their logs upright. Ours have been placed in a location that’s near our massive hemlocks so it should be shady and cool during the growing period. We get a lot of mist and rain here on the mountaintop but as they shouldn’t be allowed to get too dry, having a hose handy will be crucial.

A gardening pal of mine said she did this before and she had mushrooms the same year but it does take months and months before harvest. If this works, we’ll have enough to share, eat fresh, dry and preserve for winter use–not to mention save hundreds of dollars annually. I’ll be sure to update all of you as to our progress!

Some resources for you: We purchased our spawn, drill bit and wax from Field & Forest and were very pleased. They also have pages and pages of information to help you get started that we found very helpful. You can also order spawn from Grow Organic and this great video was what we watched to teach us how to inoculate the logs. If you want to see really cool photos of shiitake growing on logs, this post by Milkwood is neat!

Top Photo: Wikipedia