What's new
  • Happy Birthday ICMag! Been 20 years since Gypsy Nirvana created the forum! We are celebrating with a 4/20 Giveaway and by launching a new Patreon tier called "420club". You can read more here.
  • Important notice: ICMag's T.O.U. has been updated. Please review it here. For your convenience, it is also available in the main forum menu, under 'Quick Links"!

Kill healthy mycelium.

C

CrushnYuba

Well-known member
I agree that salts don't kill fungus. Don't kill bacteria either. At least the salts i usualy use.

I'm doubtful that this psilocybin species is actuality benificial though. Does anyone know if psilocybin azurecens is feeding my plant? Don't t get me wrong, i think it's cool that the pots can produce other psychoactive compounds other then thc but it can eat an insanely large amount of media. I don't want to keep losing soil for no reason.
 
therevverend

therevverend

Well-known member
Veteran
I'm doubtful that this psilocybin species is actuality benificial though. Does anyone know if psilocybin azurecens is feeding my plant?
Click to expand...

Before you read all this I'll answer your initial question about killing mycelium. Boiling water is the cheapest easiest way. This got rather long so I thought I should stick this at the top if someone doesn't want to read the entire essay...

It's definitely beneficial and feeding your plants. I've had discussions on this subject elsewhere and the consensus is that it's breaking down the woody bits into plant food. Anyone is welcome to correct my science here because I'm not a scientist but the way I understand it wood and plants consist primarily of cellulose. Cellulose is a polysaccharide polymer, a carbohydrate that's similar to starch and glucose. Basically sugar but has a crystalline form so it's much harder to break down then other carbohydrates. Doesn't dissolve in water and most organic solvents. One of the most common carbohydrates on earth. But very few organisms can process it because it's so hard to break down.

This cellulose is held together by lignin which forms a barrier around the cellulose. This lignin is extremely strong, it locks this already tough carb into a shell that's even harder. Not many things in nature can break this stuff down and conver it's massive amount of energy into nutrition. On a side note I've read sauropod dinosaurs, the big guys with the long necks. With their massive bodies and huge stomachs they were masters of cellulose digestion, able to produce enough heat and enzymes to cook the stuff down and convert it into a massive amount of energy. Look at how wood burns in a fire, it's one of the keys to how they got so fucking big. Anyway...

Wood loving fungus, along with termites, beavers, and porcupines, has replaced the sauropods as the primary processors of cellulose. Keep in mind that lots of animals eat plants and wood but very few can eat actual trees. Especially the big conifers and hardwood. Wood loving fungus, including the psilocybe types, break this stuff down easy peasy into carbs to feed your plants. It's extremely beneficial to have in your garden and you're damn lucky to have it growing naturally. You have a weird problem, very few people can complain of having too much of it, but I understand how it could become a pain in the ass.

I'm wondering if you could tinker with your soil mix, change it so it has less cellulose? Drives me crazy, every time I try to get lazy and use the bagged stuff from the stores it's loaded with wood chips. Without the power of wood loving fungus the stuff takes a long time to break down and takes more energy then it gives up to the plants. I don't mind it in my big pots with bigger plants but I hate giving it to my young plants. I'm thinking you have a lot of cellulose and lignin, stuff like peat moss and other woody products, in your mix. It's good filler because it's cheap and readily available but if it spawns too much mycelium your stuck with it.

Maybe you could compost it first, let the mycelium do it's thing in a compost pile. Then break it down into small chunks and mix it into your dirt? Once the mycelium eats it's source, runs out of food, it basically dies and other microorganisms will eat it and process it into dirt. The dirt should be great for plants. I'm also thinking if you added more inert stuff, sand and/or perlite, little rocks, etc. to replace the wood there'll be less food for the mycelium.

The problem with killing the mycelium is that it'll kill your soil, as others have pointed out but you can re-inoculate it with less aggressive strains of microorganisms. Every time you buy a bag of sterile soil mix it's basically starting from scratch so it should be fine to just let it rip. It'll get recolonized naturally. Heat is the easiest way, besides cooking it you could pour boiling water over it. Fast and effective. Messing with the PH, vinegar for instance or lye, would kill it quickly but then you might have PH problems.
 
C

CrushnYuba

Well-known member
therevverend said:
Before you read all this I'll answer your initial question about killing mycelium. Boiling water is the cheapest easiest way. This got rather long so I thought I should stick this at the top if someone doesn't want to read the entire essay...

It's definitely beneficial and feeding your plants. I've had discussions on this subject elsewhere and the consensus is that it's breaking down the woody bits into plant food. Anyone is welcome to correct my science here because I'm not a scientist but the way I understand it wood and plants consist primarily of cellulose. Cellulose is a polysaccharide polymer, a carbohydrate that's similar to starch and glucose. Basically sugar but has a crystalline form so it's much harder to break down then other carbohydrates. Doesn't dissolve in water and most organic solvents. One of the most common carbohydrates on earth. But very few organisms can process it because it's so hard to break down.

This cellulose is held together by lignin which forms a barrier around the cellulose. This lignin is extremely strong, it locks this already tough carb into a shell that's even harder. Not many things in nature can break this stuff down and conver it's massive amount of energy into nutrition. On a side note I've read sauropod dinosaurs, the big guys with the long necks. With their massive bodies and huge stomachs they were masters of cellulose digestion, able to produce enough heat and enzymes to cook the stuff down and convert it into a massive amount of energy. Look at how wood burns in a fire, it's one of the keys to how they got so fucking big. Anyway...

Wood loving fungus, along with termites, beavers, and porcupines, has replaced the sauropods as the primary processors of cellulose. Keep in mind that lots of animals eat plants and wood but very few can eat actual trees. Especially the big conifers and hardwood. Wood loving fungus, including the psilocybe types, break this stuff down easy peasy into carbs to feed your plants. It's extremely beneficial to have in your garden and you're damn lucky to have it growing naturally. You have a weird problem, very few people can complain of having too much of it, but I understand how it could become a pain in the ass.

I'm wondering if you could tinker with your soil mix, change it so it has less cellulose? Drives me crazy, every time I try to get lazy and use the bagged stuff from the stores it's loaded with wood chips. Without the power of wood loving fungus the stuff takes a long time to break down and takes more energy then it gives up to the plants. I don't mind it in my big pots with bigger plants but I hate giving it to my young plants. I'm thinking you have a lot of cellulose and lignin, stuff like peat moss and other woody products, in your mix. It's good filler because it's cheap and readily available but if it spawns too much mycelium your stuck with it.

Maybe you could compost it first, let the mycelium do it's thing in a compost pile. Then break it down into small chunks and mix it into your dirt? Once the mycelium eats it's source, runs out of food, it basically dies and other microorganisms will eat it and process it into dirt. The dirt should be great for plants. I'm also thinking if you added more inert stuff, sand and/or perlite, little rocks, etc. to replace the wood there'll be less food for the mycelium.

The problem with killing the mycelium is that it'll kill your soil, as others have pointed out but you can re-inoculate it with less aggressive strains of microorganisms. Every time you buy a bag of sterile soil mix it's basically starting from scratch so it should be fine to just let it rip. It'll get recolonized naturally. Heat is the easiest way, besides cooking it you could pour boiling water over it. Fast and effective. Messing with the PH, vinegar for instance or lye, would kill it quickly but then you might have PH problems.
Click to expand...
Thank you for taking the time to give a pretty good answer. It is not really a problem like it was years ago when i started this thread. It seems like it just ate through that celulose and really slowed down. I even inoculated more pots with this living mycelium and it never really became a problem like it was in the pots it started with. But in surprised it is still going at all. Wtf is it eating? It seems like it's at a healthy level. When it was raging, the medium was just disappearing and it would not absorb water. It was fully colonized white rubbery mycelium. Do you know what else i could be using that's a celulose source? I just read legumes are high in celulose and i was adding absurd amounts of alfalfa trying to kill it back with compost heat. But is there celulose in coco or peat?
 
maryjaneismyfre

maryjaneismyfre

Well-known member
Veteran
LOL I replied, without even seeing my earlier reply a year before, or remembering this thread, or looking at the date..but yeah..still valid LOL..
 
Chunkypigs

Chunkypigs

passing the gas
Veteran
CrushnYuba said:
Thank you for taking the time to give a pretty good answer. It is not really a problem like it was years ago when i started this thread. It seems like it just ate through that celulose and really slowed down. I even inoculated more pots with this living mycelium and it never really became a problem like it was in the pots it started with. But in surprised it is still going at all. Wtf is it eating? It seems like it's at a healthy level. When it was raging, the medium was just disappearing and it would not absorb water. It was fully colonized white rubbery mycelium. Do you know what else i could be using that's a celulose source? I just read legumes are high in celulose and i was adding absurd amounts of alfalfa trying to kill it back with compost heat. But is there celulose in coco or peat?
Click to expand...
it eats the pine bark and compost for sure, you want to keep that growth not stop it, it's what makes the redwoods so big...

the conditions regarding optimum temp, food, and moisture are rare to see in a weed pot where it will explode and colonize to the point of clumping up really heavy, you are just lucky! extra lucky if they fruit magics, lol.
 
maryjaneismyfre

maryjaneismyfre

Well-known member
Veteran
The psilocybe woodlovers are extremely resiliant, the mycelium can dry out completely, make wet and it springs back to life, it can consume a whole host of substrates and food, the cyanescens I think was first found living on a pine cone if I am not mistaken..How many other fungi can digest pine sap? That is one of the fungi that I have seen surround and consume competition pathogenic fungi, they are EXTREMELY antibiotic and bioactive as far as chiton/cellulose/beta-glucan bond digesting enzymes are concerned..The only more aggressive shit I encountered was the oysters but they live only a season then the colony is all fruited out, the wood loving psilocybes come back too life with a little food or water and keep on trucking..

I love shrooms...I used to farm em back in the day..would have hundreds of substrates to dispose of every month, for shits and giggles I'd bury bits of old substrate in all my old pot plants..had poppies, cacti, weed and shrooms growing out the same pot many a time, once on my bedside table LOL..Magic times..

BTW the redwoods are so big because of the nitrogen delivered to the forest by the Salmon every year, from the sea..Nitrogen is always the biggest limiting factor in any ecosystem, and only plants can make amino acids, which is the base of proteins, and only way to support such a mass of massive plants as you find in the Pacific NW forests is to have masses more plants supporting it, which is the algae in the pacific offshore, which gets turned into krill and plankton which gets eaten by baitfish, and then by salmon, and then by wolves and bears and redwoods.. :)
 
therevverend

therevverend

Well-known member
Veteran
But is there celulose in coco or peat?
Click to expand...

Yes, coco is pure cellulose but in a form that's even harder to break down then normal cellulose. It's incredibly tough but wood loving mycelium will eat it up like everything else. So is peat moss. As growers we take advantage of the qualities of this stuff, coir is resistant to water (think of a coconut floating in salt water for months until it reaches an island) while peat moss is highly water absorbent. I've seen peat moss turn into a white mat now that I think about it.

As far as weird substrates go I've seen a cyanescen growing out of a peanut shell on the side of a trail during an el nino year when mushroom season lasted until January. I picked up the shell with the mycelium and mushroom attached to it, wish I had a picture. They love brown paper bags. The higher the humidity the faster and thicker the stuff spreads. The sweet spot seems to be 35-65 degrees F and 80% plus humidity. I wonder if one of the reasons it isn't a big problem for you anymore is because cannabis likes it warmer and drier and you're out of that range most of the time.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Latest posts

Top