Foraging Mycorrhizal fungi

[sticky367]

I'm not an experienced icmag poster. But I have spent a decent amount of time on the site learning and want to start off by saying I really appreciate icmag for inspiring a life long affair with cannabis cultivation.

No experience outdoor or organic. I'm taking it slow this year to learn and experiment. As I grow I am realizing outdoor all natural growing is the truth! Im finally able to try it out for myself and I cannot be more excited.

I was hiking around the property to find ideal sites to plant. there are supposedly one or two springs that are giving water near the top of the hill I'm on in northern CA. I'm thinking about making large holes and planting below these springs, hopefully they can sustain enough moisture to make it through the season. its hard to tell right now because there is so much run off from rain. As I hiked lower into the trees i noticed an abundance of mushrooms in the area. I know its a great time of year to find mushrooms and i spent most of the day observing as many types as i could find. While digging around in the decomposing layers or oak and pine leaves I would often find mycelium in the soil. This gave me an idea, maybe I could dig out chunks of mycelium and fungus from the native soil to add to my own soil mix as I make my dug out beds for the new plants (will probably be some variation of Tom Hill's mix for large outdoor plants).

Would adding local mycelium to my mix make a difference?
Is this idea worth the effort? does anyone else do something like this?


Ideally i would find as many fungus mycelium and anything else i can find digging around to my soil, and then even try to inoculate with something i buy after some research or course

next year i am hoping to be able to compost for much longer and let a pile of soil sit. Im betting that my fungus plan will have more time to take action by then.

Please feel to speak up about any of this!! totally welcoming criticism and advice

I'm also thinking I will take a sample for testing of the dark rich decomposed leaves that are up to a foot deep in some areas close by.
Honestly i dont know if they could be super acidic, toxic or wonderful for my plants i have so much to learn. Either way it does look like a good source of nice compost

 

[Avinash.miles]

im curious of this as well... have often wondered about it...

 

[ghostmade]

bump

 

[who dat is]

im curious of this as well... have often wondered about it...

Ditto. Sorry but I don't have anything intellectual to offer, hoping somebody will drop some knowledge.

 

[sito007]

tag..

 

[sticky367]

Well guys, still hoping someone will drop some knowledge but I wont hold my breath. I will try to take pictures and keep you posted on my foraging/research!

 

[h.h.]

I'd use it.
I seem to remember something about using oak leaf mold being good. Too much pine needle may be a problem. I don't have either.
As far as using the leaf litter for inoculation. lucky you. Probably some good stuff. Adapted to your area...

 

[harry74]

Hello:
It is not going to work.

The mycorrhizal fungi lives in a symbiotic relationship with the trees, stucked to the roots of the tree.
If you take the mycelium away from the roots dies.
What we see above the soil is the reproductive body.

If you want to try cannabis related mycorrizal fungi, I have tried myself trichoderma arzianum and it Works ;I could see the mycelium on the roots after chopping.

Post some pics and I tell you if they are edible
On the pic above:
Boletus Aereus, Boletus Edulis, Boletus Phinopilus.

http://www.fungi.com/

If you want to learn more about all kind of mushroom,I let this link.The man who runs this companynumber 1.
I think he is located on the forests of Oregon....doing great things.

Keep growing......life.

 

[anonymousgrow]

http://www.sunseed.org.uk/wp-conten...-FOR-MAKING-YOUR-OWN-MYCORRHIZAL-INOCULUM.pdf

Just plant what you grow in the trap pots

 

[sticky367]

[URL=https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php?albumid=49503&pictureid=1187359&thumb=1]View Image[/URL]
Hello:
It is not going to work.

The mycorrhizal fungi lives in a symbiotic relationship with the trees, stucked to the roots of the tree.
If you take the mycelium away from the roots dies.
What we see above the soil is the reproductive body.

If you want to try cannabis related mycorrizal fungi, I have tried myself trichoderma arzianum and it Works ;I could see the mycelium on the roots after chopping.

Post some pics and I tell you if they are edible
On the pic above:
Boletus Aereus, Boletus Edulis, Boletus Phinopilus.

http://www.fungi.com/

If you want to learn more about all kind of mushroom,I let this link.The man who runs this companynumber 1.
I think he is located on the forests of Oregon....doing great things.

Keep growing......life.

Wow looks like good eatin harry74! Next time I'll bring my camera! I do understand that these mushrooms and the mycelium they grow from probably require specific trees to thrive. But I also remember seeing a post about mycorrhizal fungi that can tie together different species of plants. That gave me hope that there are more universal soil fungi in the area I could try to dig up. I'll try to find the thread I read that in.

 

[sticky367]

Thank you H.h, Harry, and anonymous for the responses and links. H.H do you know where you learned about the oak leaf mold?

 

[sticky367]

Harry are those the ones with porous yellow spores on the underside? Looks kinda spongy. If so we found a ton of those and determined from our book that they were edible if necessary . I was too chicken shiet on my first time to eat any though looking forward to a home cooked meal of mushies in the future!

 

[MJBadger]

The mycorrhizal fungi lives in a symbiotic relationship with the trees, stucked to the roots of the tree.

Harry is right , each fungi have their own wild niche , but micorrhizal can actually be purchased to add to compost particularly around garden/fruit trees , have seen the details on a gardening programme & no doubt a link can be found on the web .
If you have deciduous leafmould you have a great soil for growth , just dig it over a bit with the lower soil . It`s great for water retention & organic humus . Try to find out what type of tree they are & whether they are alkali or acidic growth types .
Usually the tree itself gives the clue but a few $ PH test will tell you , leafmould is a gardeners gem , if it`s there your on a winner .

 

[sticky367]

Hey anonymousgrow I dunno how to +rep but thanks for the awesome info I've heard of people growing alfalfa as a cover crop

 

[h.h.]

Leaves have a high carbon ratio and I think oak is up towards the top. It takes a long time to break down resulting in a lot of fungal activity. I think you already figured that part out though.
You may not get mycorrhizae, but fungal soil is good.

I did find a bit on pine needles.

With a C/N ratio of 500/1, pine needles are about as far as you can get from a material likely to fire up a compost heap. Yet pine straw is great for mulching beneath shrubs and trees, or between perennials. Pine straw stays put and rots slowly while retaining soil moisture and suppressing weeds. After a year, pine straw’s burnt sienna color weathers to gray, at which point it can be raked up and composted, or you can simply cover it with a fresh supply. Successive layers of decomposing pine needles will push the soil’s pH into the acidic range, which is fine for plants that prefer acidic soil, such as azaleas, blueberries, strawberries and rhododendrons. When using pine straw as a long-term mulch for other plants, simply dust on a little garden lime each fall to keep the pH from dipping too low. Don’t worry about pine straw’s effect on soil pH if you are simply using it as an attractive cover for a fall-built compost heap or Comforter Compost, because pine needles do not begin to decompose until they have been thoroughly leached by a winter’s worth of rain and snow, and a single season under pine straw will have minimal effects on the soil’s pH.

Martin, Deborah L.; Pleasant, Barbara (2008-02-13). The Complete Compost Gardening Guide: Banner batches, grow heaps, comforter compost, and other amazing techniques for saving time and money, and producing ... most flavorful, nutritous vegetables ever. (Kindle Locations 1859-1865). Storey Publishing, LLC. Kindle Edition.

 

[sticky367]

quote of a quote by ganja din not sure who originally posted this:
Links: The effects of the fungus on the soil are even more significant than its effects on the plants. As more and more plants become mycorrhizal, the fungus links one root system to the next. This is possible because the fungus can colonize almost any plant species. Experiments have shown movement of soil nutrients and even photosynthate between plants of different species, as the mycorrhizal fungi pass materials back and forth. The early ecologists who spoke of the community as a “super-organism” were not entirely wrong. Below ground, the community is to some extent a super-organism with a single nutrient uptake system. The active hyphae that make up the network are by far the biggest component of the soil microbiota, and make the essential difference between living soil and inert “dirt.”

 

[harry74]

Harry are those the ones with porous yellow spores on the underside? Looks kinda spongy. If so we found a ton of those and determined from our book that they were edible if necessary . I was too chicken shiet on my first time to eat any though looking forward to a home cooked meal of mushies in the future!

You are right.
Thi one is boletus phinopilus.
Picked up last autum in a beech forest; this one is found under pines too (phinopilus).

I´ve been picking mushrooms since I started walking more or less and the Golden rule is:

You are not sure what it is? leave it there.

In the boletus family there is one that is poisonous:

Boletus Satanas
The world of mushrooms is really amazing.
Somehow they regulate the forest.

 

[harry74]

THE ROLE OF MUSHROOMS IN NATURE

THE ROLE OF MUSHROOMS IN NATURE

Mushrooms can be classified into 3 basic ecological groups:
mycorrhizal,parasitic,and saprophytic.

Mycorrizhal mushrooms form a mutually dependent, beneficial relationship with the roots of host plants,ranging from trees to grasses.The collection of filament of cells that grow into the mushroom body is called the mycelium.

Parasitic funghi are the bane of the foresters. They do immeasurable damage to the health of resident tree species, but in the process créate new hábitats for many other organisms.
Altough the ecological damage caused by parasitic funghi is well understood, we are only just learning of their importance in the forest ecosystem.

Saprophytic funghi are the premier recyclers on the planet. The filamentous mycelial network is designed to weave between and trough the cell walls of the plant.The enzymes and acids they secrete degrade large molecular complexes into simpler compounds.All ecosystem depend upon funghi´s ability to decompose organic plant matter son after it is rendered available

Taken from "Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms"
Paul Stamets

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Stamets

 

[harry74]

Boletus Satanas

 

[h.h.]

Is trichoderma arzianum considered mycorrhizal?

We all know that there is a plethora of products on the market with super attractive labeling and names. Super Ecto Screaming Eagle Myco, is fictional but representative of the crap one is confronted with. In reality if you are serious about getting endomycorrhizal fungi to colonize the roots of your plants you should know that, according to current science of which I am aware, there are only two known endomycorrhizal fungi species which colonize the roots of cannabis/hemp.

They are Glomus Intraradices and Glomus Mosseae. If you are looking for the maximum potential to colonize roots of this species, your chances go up with the higher spore/propagule count per gram. Unless you have a mix specifically formulated I know of no product which includes only these two fungal species. Because Intraradices has been shown (through studies) to be a relatively easy colonizer of most endo-type plants world wide, it is logical to consider using it as a stand alone mycorrhizal inoculant (if you live in North America), because;

Trichoderma
Another consideration if one is contemplating purchasing one of the myco-mixes on the market, is if it contains Trichoderma spores. Because Trichoderma is so much cheaper, the spore count for it in these mixes usually eclipses all the other organisms put together. Unlike endomycorrhizal fungi, Trichoderma requires no root contact to sprout and grow. In addition to this, its favorite food is…..wait for it…..wait for it….other fungi! So you guess what happens if you inoculate your roots with a mix that contains 10,000 spores per gram of Trichoderma and 100 spores per gram total of other fungal species which are slow to sprout.

In my opinion, in most cases, "Yummy" says the Trichoderma as it gobbles down the few sprouting mycorrhizal spores.

Microcosmicgod, grasscity.com,01/10/2012
A.K.A???
http://forum.grasscity.com/organic-growing/976433-mycorrhizal-fungi-myths-truths.html