# My Glowing Mushrooms Finally Sprouted!



## Zapins

I am very excited! A few months ago, nearly a year now, I bought some glowing mushroom spores. I prepared and planted them in a piece of freshly cut hickory wood and sealed them with wax plugs. I have been keeping the log in a damp plastic container and waiting patiently for the mushrooms to show up. I checked the container today and lo and behold they are starting to produce mushrooms coming out of the wax plugs! By the looks of it the mushrooms are the glowing species and not another type. They are very young at the moment, but I'd bet within a few days the mushrooms will be full sized. I don't know if they are glowing yet or if they need to reach a mature size in order to glow but I'll take some pictures tonight when it gets dark enough!

Stay tuned for pics!


----------



## Lusher

that's interesting...keep it up


----------



## Zapins

Here are a few pics of the tiny sprouts. Most haven't opened up into heads.

The random spots on the picture are dust grains on my camera's sensor -.-

I took these pics using f/2.8, 30 second exposure, ISO-3200. With the naked eye in a dark room you can see the glowing roughly 2 seconds after you turn the lights off so they are pretty bright, you don't need to acclimatize your eyes to the dark to see them.

Enjoy!


----------



## Michael

Too cool!

How long do the mushrooms last? Will the mycelium continue to produce fruiting bodies?


----------



## Zapins

I think its until the log is completely eaten, so at least another year?


----------



## Chaoslord

That's awesome.


----------



## ts168

beautiful


----------



## niko

Time for you to learn wood carving and introduce a new craze to the market - wooden figurines with glow-in-the dark hair.

The goth part in all that is that the glowing hair gradually eats the character's head. How cool is that?

Here's a few links to get you started on the way to success:
http://www.woodcarvingillustrated.com
http://www.amazon.com/Small-Business-Dummies-2nd-Ed/dp/0061175943


----------



## bigeflashgordon

Wow this is awesome! It would look incredible in a vivarium with some dart frogs.. Where did you find these?


----------



## asukawashere

niko said:


> Time for you to learn wood carving and introduce a new craze to the market - wooden figurines with glow-in-the dark hair.


Don't give him ideas, Niko, he might just do it! '

Anyway, those are some neat-looking deranged psychedelic mushrooms, Michael. I concede that your random bursts of mad-scientist-ness occasionally yield pretty things.


----------



## Lusher

I'be read this arcticle before, also stating the if you donate around $200 you receive some species.


----------



## Yo-han

Awesome! Can you show the setup? Wondering whether they would grow in a paludarium with frogs...


----------



## chrislewistx

Congratulations Zappins. I remember when you posted looking for a fresh log. It is really interesting to see that they finally sprouted.

And thank you to Niko for the belly laugh of the day. lol Your posts never fail to amuse and educate.


----------



## Zapins

Another picture of the shrooms, they are still growing quite well. Still sprouting new growths and even after several months since I posted this thread the initial fruiting bodies are still glowing.










My setup is a plastic tub with about an inch of tap water in it. They don't like light at all and the temperature is 70F in the room (which is perfect for them). I have the lid on usually to keep the moisture high I just pulled it back for the photo. The mushrooms are really quite bright. I have no doubt that it is going to make one heck of a nice bedside table night life once the entire log fills in. I will probably move it into a small 5g aquarium so I can see it better.


----------



## Michael

This is the type of geeky bioscience stuff that I love! Could you post some links with specific information? I am seriously thinking of trying to do it myself.


----------



## Zapins

Well, I didn't really use any links to get started. I bought the spore plugs from a guy on ebay (just search for glowing mushrooms or Panellus stipticus). They came on wooden dowels that had been inoculated. The instructions that came with the kit told me to cut a fresh piece of hardwood like oak, hickory, or birch (not pine or any sappy wood), then drill holes the diameter of the plugs (tight fitting around the plugs is best) and inset the dowels into the wood. They said it was best to drill the holes in a grid pattern on the log to get the best coverage. Then after the dowels were fully inserted into the log they said to use a paraffin candle to melt wax over the holes and seal in the dowels. The moisture of the freshly cut log helps get the mushrooms growing (also a fresh piece of wood is not already inoculated with another species of mushroom) and the wax prevents drying out. They told me to soak the log over night in a bath of water and then keep it in a damp container for 2 weeks then soak again for a day. They claimed in 3 months the mushrooms would sprout.

I found that the log dried out way too quickly with their water instructions and instead I left about an inch of water in the container at all times and had the log in there pretty much set up in the same way we have our emersed setups (water line 1.5-2 inches below the level of the dowels inside the log). For about 6-8 months I had the container slightly open to let air get inside, but once the mushrooms started appearing I found that they dried out too quickly so I closed the lid to keep the humidity high. This seemed to encourage a ton of mushroom growth (and also mold/mildew growth on the other side of the bark). The mold is still there, but I think it is superficial whereas the glowing mushrooms are deep within the log consuming it from the inside out.

I know you can also grow the mushroom on wood chips or sawdust as long as you are sure you don't use pressure treated wood (the kind that looks greenish at the hardware store and doesn't rot when used to make a deck). This wood has been infused with arsenic and kills fungus.

On the mushroom forums I hear that people have grown it using rice meal but that the mushrooms do not glow brightly when grown on this media (they need acidity to glow brightly - wikipedia talks about the ideal pH). When grown in wood, especially wood with a lot of tannins like oak or hickory, they naturally achieve the optimal pH and glow brightly.

There is an article on how to make mushroom cakes and inoculate a new culture. Apparently you can get the glowing mushrooms to fruit within a month if you use sawdust and the cake method. I started preparations for using wood dust as a cake media but failed to find vermiculite (which is used to wick the correct amount of water up into the mushroom culture) so I stopped before finishing the experiment. Apparently Pearlite simply won't work, it has to be vermiculite. Unfortunately home depot doesn't sell vermiculite anymore because it is basically asbestos.

Here is more than you'll ever want to know about mushroom culture:
http://www.shroomery.org/8409/PF-Tek

Also, this is how they suggest you keep the cakes after you "birth" them (read above article to find out what that means.
http://www.shroomery.org/9047/Poor-Mans-Pod

Hope this is enough info to get you on your way.


----------



## Yo-han

Great share!


----------



## Michael

Thanks!


----------



## manini

Cool stuff!!! I will have to try this!


----------



## axelrod12

This is awesome! I definitely want to give this a try someday.


----------



## khanzer22

Been thinking to try this as well but no time as of yet... Pretty much the same instructions as what Zapins has stated above, here's the visual (video) version of it I found 



... Good luck!


----------



## LVKSPlantlady

what do you do with them? just look at them? and where are these native too?


----------



## Zapins

Pretty much, the mushrooms just glow in the dark. Interesting to look at.


----------



## Tugg

Awesome!!! The glowing fungus in every D&D dungeon is real!!! This hobby is a bottomless pit of nerd goodness. Thanks for sharing.


----------



## Congee

Damn. Now I want to get some glowing mushrooms too! Thanks for sharing!


----------



## pandragon

Hey those mushrooms are awesome!
So...I have to ask...Are they still growing or did they eat the log by now?


----------



## Zapins

They were still growing when I threw them out. I moved and had limited space for my things so they had to go.

They weren't even close to fully digesting the log.


----------



## pandragon

It's a shame you had to get rid of them, they were beautiful.


----------



## Zapins

I agree  They brought me a lot of entertainment over the last two years. Unfortunately I had to get rid of a lot of things when I moved. My aquariums included... 

I'll see what I can do about getting them back at some point.


----------



## pandragon

Sounds like you need a small self sustaining setup. Maybe set up a paludarium with some of those mushrooms in a dark cave and enough flora and fauna to keep everything fed well and happy. Good luck!


----------



## countryboy12484

We have glowing mushrooms here in the North Ga mountains. .. it use to be common to find them... but now its kinda rare.... ive heard of entire mountain sides glowing from the fungus... old timers call it fox fire


----------

