Lucky Lefty

First few Pan Cyan TTBVI to come from my bag tek experiments. Grown in an unmodified bag, on sterile recycled substrate, with zero fanning or misting. I only spawned 3 bags, purely to run as a proof of concept; as I wasn’t sure how well I could provide their preferred FAE rates in an unmodified bag. I originally intended for each bag to receive a 1:4 spawn:sub ratio; but on the very last bag of the lab sesh, I missed hilariously and spilled about half the spawn all over my work station. That bag — the one to receive half the spawn as the rest — was the first to fully colonize, pin, fruit, and harvest. These results have got me wondering if pans’ optimal nutrition level is far lower than we’ve realized yet. The concept is proven; pan cyan will fruit in bags without any special treatment. Now to work on filling out some canopies.

🚨New Product alert!🚨 🍯🐝Psi-Honey🐝🍯 Returning back to our roots with a revamp of one of the very first psilo-infusions we ever offered. These are made with a blend of 100% organic, locally sourced, raw & unfiltered orange blossom and wildflower honey; and paired with only the highest quality fruiting bodies available. Sickly sweet with deep and clear citrus notes, this stuff is perfect for coffee, tea, sandwiches, toast, oatmeal… or just by the spoonful.

Pocket full of psunshine! Sometimes all you need is a lil’ boost.

Syzygy- grown on recycled/amended high nutrient, high mineral, high vitamin, manure-based substrate. Super excited to be getting these recycling SOPs dialed in. I’m confident I’ll have a recipe performing as well or better than my fresh sub within in the next couple months- and with a cost-reduction of at least 70% between cycles. These pretty much always develop some majorly fuzzy feet- this is my oldest/very first personal isolation, and I truly don’t think I’ve ever seen it produce fruits with zero fuzz unless it’s like a 5th flush surprise/miracle fruit. Luckily it peels away easy, though I usually can’t be bothered- because it dries solid and fuses to the stipe almost indistinguishably.

Swipe to jump 24 hours (to overripe fruits lol) Recycled sub trials: Syzygy on one of the 40% (v/v) shredded straw bags. 10 gallons of organic shredded straw was added to 25 gallons of my once-fruited-upon, high-nutrient, high-mineral manure-based sub. Amending/refreshing/revitalizing this batch cost less than $1.20 per 100lbs/25gallons of substrate. This is not the best flush by any measure, and colonization/time-to-harvest were still a bit slower than I’m willing to consider “successful”. But holy hell… look at that mycelium! Pretty sure I’m heading in the right direction with these trials.

Summer doesn’t *technically* start for another 10 days, but the summer shipping menu begins its rollout TODAY! Our microdoses are vegan, contain 150mg “vitamin P”, and 150mg of our proprietary Lion’s Mane and Noni Berry extract blend. We won’t bore anyone [who doesn’t ask] with the medical breakdown, but this recipe has been constantly upgraded and honed-in over the last four years. Mood elevation, memory enhancement, creativity boost; these are our little rays of sunshine. No substrate, no mycelium, and no fillers- there are no corners cut in our process. If you’re interested in microdosing- feel free to reach out; there is a LOT of information out there, much of it conflicting… but we’re here to assist! We’ll gladly help anyone select a regimen and set intentions that work best for their personal goals. More summer offerings/announcements will be made available over the next few weeks- keep an eye out!

So uhh… that’s new. This is exactly why I try to avoid taking transfers past t10/11- this is *probably* just a response to the presence of bacteria… but it’s a stupid one if you ask me. I’ve seen this culture bacterial more times than I’d like to admit- it’s never done anything like this. Seems like every time it’s compromised, it gets more stubborn/difficult to clean up. Even my beloved trench tek has failed me on this one- that was t11. I’m just about ready to give this line the axe, it’s been a weirdo since the very beginning- and has wasted a ton of my time/resources. If I didn’t despise the use of antibiotics, I’d have hit this thing hard with em 4-5 transfers ago. It’s difficult to give up on cuts with such potential, but sometimes we have to “trim the fat”- so to speak; even assuming this is just a response to a contaminant, this culture is on it’s last strike with me. Even though I’ve been doing this quite some time, trimming said fat hasn’t gotten any easier… so I’ll give it just one more plate LOL

It feels like Psummer. Summer menu will begin rolling out 6/10- so excited to share what we’ve been working so hard on these past few months.

Recycled substrate trials: an attempt to find the absolute minimum fresh inputs I can add to my once-fruited-upon substrate to get it to produce as well as it did/does on the first run. This video, in particular, documented my first, (and most minimal) and second attempts- the only addition being 20 & 40% (respectively, by volume) shredded straw. This recycled substrate is brought just a hair past the usual field capacity. The reason behind this being; the grain (millet, in this case) left over from the first run seems to stay pretty dry/not uptake any moisture until exposed to the heat of the [re]sterilization cycle. The substrate is bagged; and either pressure cooked for 2.5 hours @ 15psi, or atmospheric sterilized/“super pasteurized”- 24 hours @ 212°F, depending on how much I need (I’ve seen virtually zero difference in results between the two over the past 10 months). Once cooled, the bags are then inoculated (under laminar flow) at a 1:5 spawn:sub ratio. The first run with this substrate was inoculated at a 1:3 ratio, bringing total volume of grain (including what’s left from the first cycle) to about 43% of the total weight (not volume) of the sub. The amount of spawn used can - and probably should - be reduced with each recycling to avoid an overabundance of nutrition causing problems/mutations. Notes: As it colonizes and fruits, the mycelium is decomposing the substrate. Upon rehydrating, you’ll notice how dense and mucky/muddy that decomposed material is in comparison to fresh inputs- it’s basically humus. 20% straw by volume was not enough to combat this density/muddiness. Cultures still colonized and fruited, but at a substantially reduced rate- and the bags were gross after shaking them up, with mud clinging all the way up to the openings. The second trial was made with 2x the volume of straw as the first, and produced much better/faster results- but is still muddier (and leaves the bags dirtier) than I’d like. The next attempt will be made with the same amount (40% by volume) of straw- along with 20% (by volume) of fresh coco coir added in hopes it’ll soak up the last of that muddy humus so I can focus on biological efficiency/yield.

×griseocaerulea F1 (a novel interspecies hybrid- P.Thaiaerugineomaculans × P. Niveo-Tropicalis) by @dedikaryotizationdaddy Excuse how remedial these samples look, they all came from the “trench tek” t1 plates, which are difficult to excise with any sort of consistency- due to the varied shapes/sizes/areas the myc can develop as it’s jumping the gap. There’s something comforting about the familiarity of those ropes. I know rhizomorphic mycelium doesn’t *technically* mean much- I’ve seen plenty tomentose cuts/species throw out full canopies. But, seeing em on such a unique species makes me feel good about my lab work/recipes… like when someone new compliments your cooking.

Swipe-to-colonize! Cambodian Outdoor- just 2 transfers from an almost 2 year old, unrefrigerated plate. Still living up to its reputation, absolutely nothing stops this cut- not even years of neglect, apparently. Colonizes quick, readily runs contam over, not sensitive to… well- really anything environmental, and loves every sugar/grain/substrate she’s ever been fed. The specimen this culture was cloned from fruited outside in a fabric pot, in 90+ degree weather (and twice-daily 20-30 degree temp fluctuations), uncovered in direct sun, on 100% untreated/unmodified/unpasteurized cactus potting soil. If you grew up like she did, you’d be a tough mf too. Now let’s get ‘er fruited, she’s earned it.

A huge shout out to @pheno_dreamers , totally floored by the generosity. Told him a bit about my ideas for establishing semi-permanent indoor exotics patches (more on those later), asked about his Hoogshagenii cut… and wound up with a mailbox full of real-life grails. I don’t do trades often, but when I do, I usually try to one-up whoever I’m trading with; and my half hasn’t landed yet… but I think I might have lost this round- these are seriously gold. Thank you. I’ve you’re looking to fruit some magic outside the realm of cubes, he’s got cultures/species out the wazoo, experience/experiments under his belt- plus an automated tub design[ed] specifically for exotics that’s pretty damn cool too. Much love, homie- can’t wait to get these figured out and dialed in.