proposed method for reducing time required for mycorrhizal colonization in cannabis

mad librettist · Feb 11, 2012

Hi there fellow geeks, here is what I am proposing:

Just as we keep mother plants, it is possible for us to keep myco mothers.

The reason we should do this? Because with only 3-6 months from seed to senescence, cannabis isn't "permanent" enough to enjoy the benefits of replacing some fertilization with inoculation in a meaningful way.

For those happy to be organic hippy type growers like myself, the easy and obvious answer is to keep a network of companion plants in specialized media designed to last for many years and growth-harvest cycles.

But what if you only want to grow cannabis in containers, and not mess this living mulch business and the extra lighting required? Well in that case I think the answer is to keep a small bed of mycorrhizal plants on a windowsill somewhere in the house.

You can start with a tray, glomus intraradices spores, some local dirt (sterilized if you must), and seeds for mycorrhizal plants that will grow easily in your environment with only window light or maybe a bit of additional lighting.

when you need to inoculate cannabis, instead of using a powder you can harvest a plug from the tray, and use the root material to inoculate rooted cutting with live mycelia instead of spores.

am I on to something or just stoned?

Weird · Feb 11, 2012

i do this when i want the benefits of myco in my soil but i dont want to cycle the soil as its growing but have the cycle completed before

I want to inoculate dirt with myco and let it run its course and add it as a top dressing or up pot with it than to keep living

i never tried to keep the mycelium living, but i am sure there is a way to keep them in feed or in greater stasis

i like the idea however of farming and having available active benies

i do this more often for bacterias when I am running teas

in the aquarium world (part of my jaded past) they use biological filters

i have incorporated them in teas and they help keep the colony alive, thus contributing to the krebs cycle, buffering ph faster and add the capacity to have a constant tea running

later i added just plain filter floss and bag to the filter compartment so three would be more surface area for bacteria to breed

basically an attempt to keep a healthy incubator for bacteria where i can simply take from and add too without having such severity in fluctuations in the brewing process

mad librettist · Feb 11, 2012

The idea is very different here.

The fungus would itself be selecting which microbes thrive.

A normal cannabis grow cycle is not long enough to see benefit from spore inoculation.

The fungus can live for some time after plant death, but can't be transferred to a medium other than live roots.

dizzlekush · Feb 11, 2012

Weird said:

I might have my science wrong here but AFAIK arbuscular mycorrhizae need a host plant to propagate and their mycelium is invisible to the naked eye. Trickoderma is green in color, so its not that. Ectomycorrhize need no host plant and their mycilium is visible with the naked eye, so we're looking at colonies of ectomycorrhizae(or some non-beneficial fungi), which is useless for cannabis, correct?

Mad your idea sounds solid to me, AFAIK they use a similar process to commercially propagate AM for sale, they just use high level sifting procedures to separate propagules from soil.

However as i understand it, host plants only have 1 significant symbiotic relationship with 1 ssp. of AM, which the host plant chooses through a process of root exudation, and the optimal ssp. has been shown to be different for different cultivars of the same species in many experiments, so the AM that colonizes your 'farming/sacrificial' plant might not be the ssp. of AM that your cannabis wants. Admittedly i know little about mycorrhizae, but IIRC my readings as well as results of many experiments come to the conclusion that any synergistic (not symbiotic) effects between AM and host plant is ssp and cultivar specific:
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=226218

mad librettist · Feb 11, 2012

all mycorrhizae are obligated to have a host. AM tend to associate with the plants we are growing, rather than trees. The actual difference between ecto and endo is whether or not the mycelia go inside plant cells or just between them.

The only way to see AM fungi is with staining. It is invisible to the naked eye.

The fungus is Weird's photos is just white mold. Soil mycelia look like strings, not like fluff.

Slimm · Feb 11, 2012

If symbiosis is the issue then make the host / inoculating plant cannabis. Btw, I think it just the glomus species that you want to culture here. AFAIK the endos and the glomus compete so use a myco mix without endos in it.

vonforne · Feb 11, 2012

I am with Mad on this one but my take is an assumption. In my no till 50 gallon totes that I veg and flower in I have inoculated the soil with spores for this round of flowering. I know the life cycle is not long enough to benefit the plants now in the containers but upon harvest I will plant the next round right where the existing plants are now. The fungi survives long enough after the death of the previous plants to attach itself to the newly planted and off they go. Not very scientific but for me a workable solution.

And as with Mad I am running different types of plants as companions with the cannabis strains I am growing to aid in this procedure.

dizzlekush · Feb 11, 2012

Slimm said:
If symbiosis is the issue then make the host / inoculating plant cannabis. Btw, I think it just the glomus species that you want to culture here. AFAIK the endos and the glomus compete so use a myco mix without endos in it.

All organisms in the glomus genus are endomycorrhizae, however the term endomycorrhizae is being replaced in academia and science by the terms "Arbuscular mycorrhize" or the less common "Vesicular-Arbuscular Mycorrhizae", when it applies (not all arbuscular mycorrhizae have vesicles).

Crusader Rabbit · Feb 11, 2012

mad librettist said:
The fungus is Weird's photos is just white mold. Soil mycelia look like strings, not like fluff.

I think that the white fuzz in the photos is the stalks of the fruiting bodies of the fungus growing up into the air to release spores, not the mycelia which thread through the soil and absorb nutrients.

Weird · Feb 11, 2012

dizzlekush said:
I might have my science wrong here but AFAIK arbuscular mycorrhizae need a host plant to propagate and their mycelium is invisible to the naked eye. Trickoderma is green in color, so its not that. Ectomycorrhize need no host plant and their mycilium is visible with the naked eye, so we're looking at colonies of ectomycorrhizae(or some non-beneficial fungi), which is useless for cannabis, correct?

Mad your idea sounds solid to me, AFAIK they use a similar process to commercially propagate AM for sale, they just use high level sifting procedures to separate propagules from soil.

However as i understand it, host plants only have 1 significant symbiotic relationship with 1 ssp. of AM, which the host plant chooses through a process of root exudation, and the optimal ssp. has been shown to be different for different cultivars of the same species in many experiments, so the AM that colonizes your 'farming/sacrificial' plant might not be the ssp. of AM that your cannabis wants. Admittedly i know little about mycorrhizae, but IIRC my readings as well as results of many experiments come to the conclusion that any synergistic (not symbiotic) effects between AM and host plant is ssp and cultivar specific:
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=226218

let me explain my little experimentation

these were part of my foray into organics

its simply premier peat, ewc, perilite pinch of bone blood and dr earth which i had used primarily for the benies added

i do not get visible fungus if i do not use a light crate and have regulated temps

now if i understand correctly, the visible growth is most likely an expression of the ectomycorrhiza put in the soil but it offers me some insight to the a few factors including if my soil is supporting fungal growth and how that growth is cycling

regardless since most practical myco applications are judged and justified by results not by soil samples the best I can do is cycle the soil with right components and gauge my efforts by my results

i did find the mortar pan and light crate a very good environment for creating a surface area dominate space for with great potential for mycelium propagation

mad librettist · Feb 11, 2012

now if i understand correctly, the visible growth is most likely an expression of the ectomycorrhiza put in the soil but it offers me some insight to the a few factors including if my soil is supporting fungal growth and how that growth is cycling

again, no. you have mold, not mycorrhizae. Those are not fruiting bodies. They are patches of mold. You have saprophytic fungi imperfecti. They do not produce fruiting bodies, aka mushrooms. They are living off the nutrients and water present in your soil.

white mold is harmless.

white mold is not mycorrhizal.

If you had shrooms about to fruit the mat of hyphae would be very easy to see/feel.

The issue is not symbiosis, it's simply time. Starting from a spore takes a long time and won't help your growth rates or really protect from pathogens by the time you harvest. (in other words most people waste money on spores)

vonforne · Feb 11, 2012

I get the same results with Espoma and FoxFarm bagged nutrients with mycorrhizae and my brother who has the same soil mix gets the same results with Dr.Earth guano with mycorrhizae.

I am using Happy Frog 0-5-0 guano in small quantities now for the same result.

V

Weird · Feb 12, 2012

mad librettist said:
again, no. you have mold, not mycorrhizae. Those are not fruiting bodies. They are patches of mold. You have saprophytic fungi imperfecti. They do not produce fruiting bodies, aka mushrooms. They are living off the nutrients and water present in your soil.

white mold is harmless.

white mold is not mycorrhizal.

If you had shrooms about to fruit the mat of hyphae would be very easy to see/feel.

ok thanks for clearing this up.

The issue is not symbiosis, it's simply time. Starting from a spore takes a long time and won't help your growth rates or really protect from pathogens by the time you harvest. (in other words most people waste money on spores)

isn't this the reasoning behind inoculating the soil before you use it?

references of on farm propagation of am fungus incoculum detail collecting spores at the end of host plants life cycle as a mycorrhizal inoculant for next season planting soils

so id i understand instead of harvesting spores and inoculating another container with it your trying to relocate living AM to a different root mass

dont you want to keep the root mass of the donor plant alive and how much faster is inoculating the soil with even hypha than spore innculation?

is it fast enough to make a difference regardless?

but since you made me question my fungal dominant soil cooking (which i am happy with as far as results) technique, i have been reading about AM myco and I think you can do what your proposing with a hybrid of your existing techniques

let me expalin

regardless of how you introduce it, myco needs time to propagate

but you would think a living established myco should reproduce faster than from spore

it appears the best carrier for living AM myco hyphal network is a living root system

so why not grow those AM companion plants in window sill containers and populate them with the ground cover living mulch plants you use in other containers and then cycle them into the grow containers for the pot

let the living mulch cover plants bet he carrier for the AM hyphal network

mad librettist · Feb 12, 2012

let the living mulch cover plants bet he carrier for the AM hyphal network
__________________

lol you can just follow my living mulch thread, be a hippy organic grower like me, and take advantage of a living mycorrhizal NETWORK of species.

I am trying to offer something to people not necessarily willing to keep a living mulch under artificial lighting, but interested in using mycorrhizal associations to support cannabis

dont you want to keep the root mass of the donor plant alive and how much faster is inoculating the soil with even hypha than spore innculation?

much, much faster, AFAIK

Weird · Feb 12, 2012

mad librettist said:
lol you can just follow my living mulch thread, be a hippy organic grower like me, and take advantage of a living mycorrhizal NETWORK of species.

i could ...

I am trying to offer something to people not necessarily willing to keep a living mulch under artificial lighting, but interested in using mycorrhizal associations to support cannabis

i appreciate the effort, so much so i would like for it to make sense and be practical

most people growing in artificial conditions are using every square inch for cannabis so the biggest objection to living mulch is probably the loss of indoor grow space

if i am going to the effort of growing myco compatible plants so i can have access to live AM myco its not to save money on powders or to save effort its for the benefit of fresh inoculates

every technique i am reading about inoculation requires end of life cycle spore harvesting or co planting.

it seems if you are growing myco companion plants spreading their roots into a container you want to inoculate is not as effective as co planting them, unless your suggesting co planting the companion plant(seems they would be overly competitive for resource vs living mulch cover) it wasn't very clear

so why not add some of the living ground cover or mulch as a suggested carrier to that plant in the window

much, much faster, AFAIK

https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?p=4945214#post4945214

mad librettist · Feb 12, 2012

the fungus is able to colonize many, many different species.

with clover and cannabis, they have glomus intraradices in common.

so you just pull a plug of clover out from your tray in the window, and drop it in next to your seedling/cut.

when the roots grow into the colonized clover roots, they will also be colonized, and as the cannabis roots fill the medium they will be mycorrhizal.

that's the idea, at least.

to do the same with spores is not practical. the medium will first be colonized by non-mycorrhizal cannabis, then colonization will happen later on, only it doesn't have until later on. spores only germinate in the presence of roots.

dizzlekush · Feb 12, 2012

mad librettist said:
spores only germinate in the presence of roots.

In reality the spores only germinate when the roots exude Strigolactones. When strigolactones can be somewhat effectively condensed or manufactured and become available for purchase (which might be quite some time from now) theoretically you can start growing AM with strigolactones and proper carbohydrate analogs in culture dishes and possibly soil, but its possible that the strigolactones will be too expensive for purchase, however it takes unfathomably small amounts of strigolactones for such effects to be achieved (were talking parts per trillion here IIRC).

mad librettist · Feb 12, 2012

dizzlekush said:
In reality the spores only germinate when the roots exude Strigolactones. When strigolactones can be somewhat effectively condensed or manufactured and become available for purchase (which might be quite some time from now) theoretically you can start growing AM with strigolactones and proper carbohydrate analogs in culture dishes and possibly soil, but its possible that the strigolactones will be too expensive for purchase, however it takes unfathomably small amounts of strigolactones for such effects to be achieved (were talking parts per trillion here IIRC).

they germinate, then what?

it's an obligate symbiote

Weird · Feb 12, 2012

http://invam.caf.wvu.edu/index.html -- interesting international AM site

culture methods

aeroponic

http://invam.caf.wvu.edu/methods/cultures/aeroponic.htm

transplant

http://invam.caf.wvu.edu/methods/cultures/transplant.htm

index to other culture methods

http://invam.caf.wvu.edu/methods/cultures/cultindex.htm

dizzlekush · Feb 12, 2012

mad librettist said:
they germinate, then what?

it's an obligate symbiote

I thought it was implied, ill go into greater detail then.

Strigolactones initiate germination of AM, increase mitochondrial activity and density of AM, increase cell proliferation of AM (growth), and promote pre-symbiotic branching of AM. This naturally occurs in the rhizosphere as a/the plant starts lacking nitrogen and/or phosphorous and exudes specific strigolactones into the rhizosphere, or when certain environmental cues happen. The entire process usually unfurls in a 4-6 week period. One could essentially sidestep this whole 4-6 week natural forming of symbiosis by doing this process yourself, as i previously mentioned, saving your plants 4-6 weeks of work/waiting...

Again this is all just theory, im not aware of strigolactones ever being concentrated or synthesized and utilized in any sort of experimentation. We're pretty slow when it comes to strigolactone research ATM. We've known about them for over 15 years and have thought they were detrimental to plant growth for more than half the time we've been aware of them (because they were exuded by witches weed). Only ~7 years ago we discovered that they had beneficial aspects , and only 4 years ago did we find out that they are one of the essential groups of phytohormones in all (terrestrial at least) plants.

proposed method for reducing time required for mycorrhizal colonization in cannabis

Active member

3rd-Eye Jedi

Active member

Member

Active member

Member

vonforne

Member

Active member

3rd-Eye Jedi

Active member

vonforne

3rd-Eye Jedi

Active member

3rd-Eye Jedi

Active member

Member

Active member

3rd-Eye Jedi

Member