Looks like moss to me, I don’t think lichenized moss is a thing. Some close up shots would help.

I would maybe start saying ‘agarics’ instead to prevent confusion.

If you are using an app that gives you a little AI blurb the language/tone it uses makes it sound like there can be no mistake. For some people that’s all they need. Last week I saw someone post about how grok had “definitively” ID’d this person’s mushroom as Pluteus cervinus from one photo. It was very clearly Hypholoma fasciculare.

Yeah, I can do all that but I draw the line at larvae, as dumb as that sounds. Irrational fear, but I’m getting better haha

Definitely worth the risk for me, I can’t improve my skills let alone ID a mushroom if I don’t pick it up and get a good look. If you aren’t comfortable with it that’s fine but telling people to just not touch mushrooms doesn’t help anyone because no one has ever died or become sick from touching a mushroom.

I saw a post from a vet today on one of the ID forums, a dog had eaten a mushroom and was very ill. Preliminary ID was A. phalloides. Absolutely heartbreaking, I’d never get over that.

All mushrooms are safe to handle with bare hands. Sure, if you’ve spent the whole day groping death caps you might want to rinse off but you really don’t need to wash after touching a mushroom. You actually have to ingest to be poisoned. As far as I know, spores are only harmful if the get into the lungs regularly over a prolonged period and that goes for all spores, not just ones from toxic mushrooms.

I love this, they seem to be very happy! I would be slightly worried about air quality due to the thick layer of spores that are produced on the surface of the cap. Turned the inside of my tent brown when I wasn’t watching.

A ready-made block should be fine in the kitchen, garage too if it not too cold for the species you’re trying to grow and has a light you can keep on for at least 8hrs. Balancing the humidity and fresh air levels is the trickiest part for a counter-top grow but you sort of get a feel for it after some trial and error.

I use oats for spawn and hardwood/soybean hulls for substrate. I don’t think a monotub would have enough FAE but I don’t have much experience with them.

100% - I gave my parents in law a 5 gal bucket to grow their own at home, and it flushed 5 or 6 times before they emptied it into the compost. Masters mix with boiled water poured over top, I thought it would contaminate because it wasn’t properly sterilized, but had no issues colonizing.

Mostly smells like mushrooms/mycelium. I use a mix of soybean hulls and hardwood fuel pellets so no manure or anything stinky.

Neat, I imagine one with slits in the side would be similar to fruiting in a 5gal bucket where you tape off the holes to keep moisture in. I recently read an article on growing mushrooms in large columns of substrate with egg carton material wrapped around the outside, it wasn’t very descriptive but I thought the idea was cool.

There are cheaper options than a tent setup, you can find lots of little tutorials online. For a couple of years I used a ‘shotgun fruiting chamber’, it’s a tote with lots of tiny holes drilled in it, and some damp perlite in the bottom. You mist the inside and occasionally lift the lid to introduce fresh air.

I typically set mine for 95% RH to initiate pin formation, I bump that down to 80-85% while the fruit grows out. It gets tricky when you are trying to get juggle getting new pins on some blocks and growing out mushrooms on others, then I just play it by ear.

Yeah, they’re pretty easy. If I had to do it over again I would start with pink oysters. They aren’t as oxygen-hungry as blue oysters and they fruit just as reliably, if not more.

I would definitely try a grow block and see how you like it, it can be a little tricky to get the fresh air and humidity right if you’re fruiting on a counter top but I wouldn’t let that discourage me.

I’m curious about the ceramics, what do you use? Like a big sauerkraut pot? I use the plastic because it’s easiest to work with and with jars I feel like the substrate weight to yield ratio isn’t as efficient.

No, I make these up myself and they are not compostable.

We would pick all of this at once and either eat them, bag them up for family, or freeze/dehydrate. Especially important to pick the oysters and pioppinos because leaving them for too long can result in major spore dumping which it’s good for your lungs and we use a mask if that happens or if spending extended time in the tent.

We’ve invested a good bit of money into this, maybe a couple thousand or more? We’ve spent that over about 6 years, mostly outfitting the fruiting tent and HEPA flow hood. I would definitely suggest doing it on a budget at first, totally doable - I used to do lab work lab work in front of an air purifier and the fail rate was surprisingly low. I wouldn’t say it takes up a lot of time once you’re confident doing sterile work. I spend a lot of time cleaning as well as sterilizing substrate which takes about 3 hrs, but 2.5hrs of that is just babysitting the pressure cooker. I’m not sure if I would say it’s hard to get into but there is quite a learning curve and probably my ADHD-fueled love of mushrooms helped me get over that.