Mushrooms, Mushrooms, & more Mushrooms

You may remember the last trip I made to the mushroom farm when I got a flat tyre on the trailer in my street.......well I  have some update photos to share with you......
I get my mushroom compost bags for $3 each from the Fort Drummond Mushroom Farm in Mt St Thomas .....you need to ring ahead to pick them up, and I was recommended Thursdays for pick up......
There details are:

Fort Drummond Mushroom Farm
Television Avenue,
Mt St Thomas  NSW  2500, Australlia
 (02) 4228 5403


I would also recommend that you tell them you are planning to use the compost bags for the garden, and possibly gather a few a few mushrooms before hand if any pop up.  Of course when you water them lightly twice a day, and store them in a cool, dark place like under the house.....You will reap a few harvests of lovely fresh mushrooms like I have.


I have had three good harvests so far from this lot...and there is still more to come....when you see little tiny pin-head mushrooms coming through, its important to remember to water them, as they are vulnerable to drying out and not growing on to huge mushrooms. 


Also when you think there are no more mushrooms coming up, keep watering them twice a day for anything up to 10 days or more, and you will find more little pin-heads poking through the soil, ......just when you think there are no more mushroom spores.....you get more.


I drool over these photos

My good friend Sonia told me that if you sprinkle broken mushrooms in a garden bed and cover with soil, that you will get mushrooms to grow. I have a little experiment going in the new Berries garden bed....I covered the mushroom bits....and keep the soil moist.....I just have to wait now....
Thanks Sonia,, for the great tip....If I get mushrooms come up, I will post about it.

21 April.....First harvest

25 April......Second harvest

28 April........Third harvest...Wow!!!

So about every third or fourth day.....I am picking mushrooms. I just can't complain.
Sonia, I hope your bags of mushroom compost are producing for you as well.

Another trip to the mushroom farm and a very flat tyre.

I have been pretty busy today...probably over done it again...Oh well...that's what bedtime is for...to recover for the next day..lol....
Here is some of the work I did today....and what an adventure....

First off, I had to empty the trailer of dirt again....There wasn't much left...this load is from filling the new garden in the front yard.....I actually had 5 wheelbarrows of soil left...wow...it didn't look like that much...and I had to have the trailer on the card and heading off by 10.30....
Where do you think I was going with the trailer on?
To get more Mushroom Compost of course. At $3 a bag...and I could get anything from no mushrooms to 2kg from each bag.  How can I resist after the last lot I got? I love fresh mushrooms and they are so healthy for you.

Picture my DS16 and I walking out of the bunker stuffing our faces with freshly picked mushrooms...I had to buy a kilo for an aunty and we just couldn't help it...so fresh.....We're standing outside the bunker waiting for the men to come and load the trailer...eating freshly picked mushrooms...and DS16 turns to me and says...."They just don't get any better than this Mum...they're so fresh, we should buy more"....lol matey...that's why I am buying the bags of compost...I'm not paying $6 kg when in a few days we will have our own....Yep mushies are $6 from the mushroom farm, much cheaper, and much much fresher.

After offloading a few bags to Sonia on the way home,
and some for a neighbour.

On returning home, there was a bus parked across the road, and seeing I only like reversing the trailer from one way....and the bus being in direct path of my sharp turning car....I went to the end of the street, and turned around.  Well, we nearly made it home without any hiccups, and we would have too, if I hadn't hit the gutter when making the u-turn.....Oooops....huge buster with a flat tyre....lucky I don't live on a long street, with that big load of soil in the back; Boy, did it make some noise with each revolution of the tyres....
Oh well, it will give the neighbours something else to talk about hey..lol....
Outof the car, and about 15 minutes later, all is good and the original rim is in the back of the car to go to be replaced. After that I can put the spare back on the front of the trailer.

I thought I would be changing the tyre on the trailer, but you know your boys are growing up when you can just sit back and give instruction...I'm oh so proud. He knows more about the compressor than I do...lol, but I had to show him where to put the jack.

After DS16 changed the tyre, he even helped unpack the trailer and put the compost bags under mums unit....What a gem is he....School holidays can be a blessing. Do you get your children working while they are on their school holidays?
Sorry, it was too hot to do a tutorial on this one....and I still had a lot more to do in the garden....
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Like a new bed for the berries...I have a thornless blackberry which is very sad...I have had it for I think two seasons now, and it isn't growing very well....I think maybe, just maybe it doesn't like being WHIPPER SNIPPED...yep...you heard me....DS16 is a bit slap happy with the Whipper Snipper around the poor blackberry vine.....
But before I go any further I am going to make this another post.....so off I go....are you following.....?????

MUSHROOMS GALORE

A big trip into town to the mushroom farm proved to be far more than I expected...Wanting the mushroom compost for the garden, but planning to harvest what mushrooms are left in the spores...I decided on 15 bags.....at $3 each, that's not bad....very cheap really seeing you can get a crop off them first.
I spotted a huge bag, and commented on how big it was, and how many mushrooms must be in it....The gentleman told me. "Oh no, thats just stems, do you want a bag, we give it away for compost, it breaks down within about two weeks", not wanting to miss a great opportunity I said yes immediately.....

Now when the fine young gentleman loaded up the trailer for me with the compost bags, which I had paid for....he then went and got two of these huge bags of stems....he then told me, "There's two more out there, do you want them?"   Is the sun hot? of course I wanted them.....

When I got them home and opened them up....I seen there were actually mushrooms mixed in with the stems....Too rough to sell, I suppose they just throw 'em out......

I got mum into gear to help sort the stems and mushrooms....Out of the four bags, I still have 1 to sort through.....

But here are the photos I took of our production line.....The lady is my mum

I still have one bag to sort through....and I got all these so far......they cleaned up well with a dunk in the water....I plan on dehydrating this lot..
Then there are the mushrooms I will harvest from the bags..........I will take a photo of them tomorrow......I am stiff and sore as I HAD to finish unloading the trailer of soil first before I could get this lot....I am glad I did...but Ohhhh I am aching......I will have to pick up the animal fat from the butchers tomorrow....after I sort out that other bag.
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Saturday 26 Feb 2011
So here is an update to the mushrooms galore...I have finally sorted through the stems, that was a huge bounty....and thankfully, they are shrinking down to a fair size....the dehydrator may be able to get a rest for a while shortly....

I put all the stems into the compost bin, and as the gentleman said to, I have also covered them with dirt, because as they rot and break down, they are going to smell.....so they are covered; but not before taking a few more photos.

 One of the bags of mushroom compost, being moved to under the house. Cost $3.00

I hope I have enspired you to try growing mushrooms from your muchroom compost.....................
As the mushrooms grow, I shall keep this post going with updates....
so check back in a few days....and thanks for reading my blog.