Mold Growing

Hey there, I posted pics of my APE a few days ago, and I've harvested a few since! Unfortunately, I noticed some mold (seems like either penicillium or trichoderma) growing in the corner of the bin. I cut out a large area around the visible parts of the mold hoping that would be enough to stop it from spreading any further, but it seems like that was a pretty naive approach, and now I can see it growing again on the edges where I cut. I've attached close up pics of the mold as well as a pic of the bin overall. What's the best course of action here?

Hey Mazolei! Sure, I remember your first thread here ;-)

Yep, cutting the moldy area never stops it. Moreover, you spreaded the mold even more (during the cutting process)

What can you do now?

1. Harvest all shrooms (they're fine and save!) and toss the cake

OR

2. To let your shrooms mature, make a salt application – just pour a regular salt over contaminated area and around it.

As an example, check out this thread here.

Also Trichoderma and Penicillium guides for the future.

This will seal the area and stop contam. So that, you'll win some time for your shrooms to mature. Don't spray/mist the tub!

Unfortunately, you can't rehydrate this cake for the 2nd flush. So, toss the cake right after harvesting.

Feel free to ask if anything is unclear, and let me know how it goes.

Good luck 🤞

P.S. Why this contam happened is another topic. We'll discuss it later ;-)

Thanks so much for the advice, I really appreciate it! Should I try to get a look under the coco coir to see how much it's spread, or is that more likely to just spread it around more? Also, given that most of the mold seems to be on the sides of the cake where I cut, applying salt might be a little awkward but I'll figure it out :p

No, don't "try to get a look under the coco coir" and try not to touch it.

Thick layer of salt (or slightly wet salt) will stick to the cake even from the side. And salt kills mold deeper inside, (as well as mushroom mycelium, unfortunately)

One more alternative option – is H2O2 application – soak a paper towel or synthetic cloth in hydrogen peroxide 3% and put it on contaminated area to cover it completely. In this way you'll seal it and prevent further mold spores spreading. After that you can spray this area with H2O2 additionally (right on that paper towel/cloth, don't remove it)

I decided to go with H2O2 since the only salt I have right now is coarse salt for grinding. I've attached a pic of the paper towel.

Well done! It looks like emergency bandaging now lol 🤕

Hope it will be fine, keep me posted 🤞

Haha, it does look like bandaging lol I'll keep you posted, for sure! You've been super helpful to us, it's really great. If you don't mind answering another question, I was wondering if we should try and get some spore prints from this flush? Of course I don't want to contaminate them, but getting new spores is fairly cumbersome for me. Originally I planned on waiting until the second flush to try and get prints, but I'm not sure if there will be a second flush now, and I don't want to lose the opportunity.

Sure, you can try to make some spore prints (check the guide here: How to make a spore print) or spore swabs – just wipe the mushroom cap underneath (gills) with a sterile spore swab and store it in a zip bag. You can collect spores from ANY flush or from ALL flushes as much as you want.

Note: APE spores are white and/or transparent

However, they won't be sterile. In fact, no spore print is 100% sterile.

Tip: you can always clean up the culture on agar ;-)

Please, share photos of your cake and shrooms before harvesting 🙏 Your example in dealing with mold will be helpful to other growers

Well, about that... we've already harvested most of this first flush, but it does seem like we've got a few more coming in! Is there anything specific you'd like pictures to focus on? I'm more than happy to help you get some pics that'll be helpful for other people :3

Congrats on your first harvest 🥳 Do you know how much have you harvested?

Nothing special, just share your experience, your progress, some updates, issues and ofc successes on the way ;-)

For example, we made a mold treatment with H2O2 and you showed it, so great!👍 Then it would have been great to see what happened next ;-)

So far we've got about 16g of dried APE! I've attached a picture of everything we've harvested and dried so far. I've also attached a picture of the current state of the bin - I put another patch of paper towel down because I saw what looked like a very faint bit of fuzzy mycelium growing in the coir. That said, it seems like the initial patch is working well! I've been making sure it doesn't dry out.

So nice!

And more shrooms popping up...

Thanks for sharing, I appreciate it!