Getting Started With Golden Oyster Mushrooms

This past week, I noticed that our very first Golden Oyster Mushroom has started fruiting! Then when I came to update my post about Golden Oyster mushrooms, I realized I never wrote an original post. Whoops!

Anyway, when we started the Wine Cap Mushrooms, we also got spawn for Golden Oysters. We decided to make use of some cattle protein tubs because they were readily available for free. First we washed them out. We filled five of the tubs with wheat straw and water so that we could soak the straw for three days. (By the end of three days it smelled pretty ripe!) Eli and I then dumped the tubs to allow the extra water to run out. We consolidated the wet straw into four tubs so we could begin the next step.

We drilled two rows of 1 1/2″ holes in the first tub.  We then put in a 3-4″ layer of the wet straw, then a layer of the Golden Oyster spawn (broken up and scattered on the straw). We continued this layering until the tub was full with the top layer being straw. We repeated the process for two more tubs that are completely full and one more tub that is about half full.

Golden Oyster Spawn

A layer of straw with Golden Oyster spawn.

We then moved the barrels under a lean-to roof so that they would be in shade for the biggest part of the day. I have checked them periodically to make sure that the straw doesn’t dry out. When necessary, I have poured water into the tubs until it runs out the holes.

The tub that has started fruiting is one of the full ones. It is so hard to wait for them to get bigger before we harvest them! We are all watching and waiting anxiously for them to get large enough that we can all enjoy our first crop of Golden Oyster Mushrooms.

I have to say, I was really expecting the Wine Caps to fruit first but the Golden Oysters proved me wrong.

Blessings,

Jennifer