🍄[AUDIO FIXED] Soil Dwelling Fungi, Synganic Growing, and Garden Mushrooms, with OklahomaFungi
9:16AM Jan 29, 2025
Speakers:
Jordan River
Keywords:
soil dwelling fungi
mycorrhizal fungi
Oklahoma fungi
mushroom festival
mycorrhizal benefits
trichoderma benefits
native microbes
inky cap mushrooms
yellow parasol
CO2 bags
living soil
cannabis cultivation
mycorrhizal inoculants
mushroom foraging
fungal diversity
Greetings, cultivators worldwide. Jordan River here back with more grow cast sporulating. We have a brand new guest to this show. Members already know him. If you've been to our community cup, you also saw him speak live. Oklahoma fungi is on the line. My friend Jacob is here to talk about soil dwelling fungi. This is a really great episode, and it's going to change the way that you look at fungi in your soil, mycorrhiza, and more. You're going to absolutely love this episode. But before we get into it with Jacob, shout out to AC infinity, that's right. Acinity.com, code grow, cast one five for the biggest savings you can find, grab yourself a Grow Tent kit. Grab yourself a tent, a light, a fan, whatever you need. They have it now. We started working with AC infinity years ago, and all they sold was their cloud line fan. We did a call with them. I remember my old producer, Rob, and I did a call with AC infinity, and they said, We want to break into the Grow game. And boy, have they. Now, years later, they've got everything you need to grow top quality cannabis at home. They've got the best tents on the market if you need a Grow Tent, AC infinity.com, code grow cast one, five. They've got the thicker tent poles. They've got the thicker canvas. Their inline fans are the best in the game. Their new ion grid light is an amazing bar style light. They've got humidifiers, and now they've even got refillable carbon filters. This is going to totally change the game. No more throwing out those carbon filters. I always feel so bad when I toss those things out. Well now you can just refill the brand new activated charcoal in the carbon filter by AC infinity. It's the last carbon filter you're ever gonna buy. You can find it and so much more, from lights to fans to pots and scissors at AC infinity.com. Code, grow, cast one, five, always, everybody. Thank you so much to AC infinity for being ongoing supporters. Thank you to you listeners and enjoy this lovely show with Oklahoma fungi. Hello podcast. Listeners, you are now listening to grow cast. I'm your host, Jordan River, and I want to thank you for tuning in again today, before we get started, as always, I urge you to share this program, send this episode out to a grower or get a smoker growing for the first time. It's how you can help us on our mission of overgrow and see everything we're doing at growcast podcast.com/action, that's where you'll find the seeds and the membership and the classes and everything. Or just go to grow cast podcast.com, you'll see it all there. Thank you for your support. Listeners. Today, we have a brand new guest to this show, good friend of ours. We collaborated on the community cup, an amazing speaker that day at the community cup, and also already a two time grow cast TV guest for the members, but I'm realizing now, first time guest on grow cast podcast. We have none other than Oklahoma fungi on the line. What's up, Jacob, how you doing? Man,
hey, I'm doing really well. Jordan, thank you so much for allowing me to come on here and chat about mushrooms and much more.
Yeah. Man, well, listen, I love your education. You're hard at work here in Oklahoma doing all sorts of events, popping up doing free classes everywhere. You know, I love that education that focus on doing in person classes. You really do a great job, man. So I love mushroom enthusiasts such as yourself. Today, we're going to talk about mushrooms, but we're also going to specifically focus in on the fungi that affects the plants that we care about so much. But before that, you got a mushroom festival coming up in October. Man, you want to talk about that for a second?
Yeah, absolutely. So Oklahoma has never had a mushroom Festival, and so this is something that I've been hoping we could make happen for the past three years, since I started Oklahoma fungi. And so this year, on national mushroom day, which is October 15, from 10am to 7pm we're going to be hosting a festival that is family friendly and education oriented. So right now, we have 43 vendors signed up. Four of them are food the other 40 are general market vendors or mushroom artists or mushroom supplement manufacturers. It's an all day mushroom event, and kids under the age of 13 are free, and all adults or anyone above the age of 13 tickets start at $15
that is so cool. What can people expect as far as the speaking and the education?
Yeah, so right now, we have eight speakers lined up, ranging from a dean of a local university to doctors of mycology at University of Central Oklahoma. So we have eight, eight speakers, and each of the topic is going to be relating to fungi. Some of them are about poisonous mushrooms. Some of them are about edible mushrooms. Mine will be about foraging mushrooms. And one of the most interesting topics, in my opinion, will be the Oklahoma psilocybin research program discussion. So at the very end of the night, we're going to close it off with a discussion with a doctor and a citizen lobbyist to talk about one of the pitfalls that we've seen in the Oklahoma program and this research not being passed. We're also going to have about five. Hands on workshops. So if you have a VIP ticket and you don't want to attend to talk, you can scoot right over to the workshops and do some hands on workshops, like growing mushrooms or learning how to make monotubs Or do agar work. So we're really trying to make it a hands on event, and make sure that there's access for everyone, depending on what type of learner you are,
I love it, man. And you made a code grow cast so that my audits can save some money.
Yes, grow cast 10. Check it out on all of our tickets. If you purchase them online, use the promo code grow cast 10 to get 10% off. And yeah, come Come check out Jordan. Come meet Jordan. Come meet me at the mushroom festival. We're going to have an immersive experience room that's going to be built out like a forest. It's going to have mist and fog and sounds of the forest, and there'll be nice mushroom things and decorations, a good place to sit and meditate if you want. And check it out the Wow, all the nice decorations.
Oklahoma fungi.com is where the tickets are. Oklahoma.
Yeah, you can go to if you want. You can go to Oklahoma fungi.com forward slash, okay, mush fest. Or you can just type in, okay, mush fest.com Oh,
I love it. Okay, mush fest com, we'll bring you right there. Um, amazing. I'm excited for that. Man, you know this link between microbes and plants, specifically fungi and plants, it's, I know it's a developing field. It's so immersive and deep and fascinating and intricate, but the more I learn, the more fascinated that I am. You know what I mean? You take a look at the evolution of any living thing, really, whether you're talking about plants and their ability to adapt to their environments and survive, or even things like insects. You go back far enough and there's some interaction with these microbes. Hell, the stone tape theory says that me and you might be speaking right now and actually communicating through language due to mushrooms. So like I said, it's just infinitely complex and infinitely interesting to me, and I love to dive into it from a gardening perspective. Now, Jacob, what I'd like to ask you, what I'd like to start with, is focusing in on one very specific type of fungi, and I want you to define it, to be honest, because I've been told, as a cannabis grower, this word mycorrhizal fungi so much and for so long that I realized that if someone came to me and said, What does that even mean? I couldn't answer that question. I know it's I know it's the type that we're after in the garden. I know that. I know that endo mycorrhizal fungi is what bonds with cannabis, but I couldn't tell you what that classification or kingdom was, or how it compares to others, you know what I mean. So I want to start from the beginning. How do you, as a mushroom guy, look at mycorrhizal fungi? And what does that even
mean? Yeah, so for for me, when I first got into mushrooms, you know, I actually, I didn't realize that, you know, that mycorrhizal fungi were even more proliferant, like they were just everywhere, more so than mushroom foraging. And so I thought it was really interesting that I thought mushrooms were everywhere. But then I started learning more about microbes and mycorrhizal fungi, and I really learned that there's actually a really vast world that if you get a microscope, you'll be astonished what you what you'll find in the soil, right? And so for me, you know mycorrhiza means fungal root. And so one of the things that you'll find is that these mycorrhizal fungi, they all have these associations with plants, and it's at the root. And so majority of these organisms, they can't survive on their own. They they survive through a symbiotic relationship with their plant host. So if their plant host isn't there, oftentimes they'll sit dormant in the soil, in their spores or in their own like their their capsules that they've created. But for the most part, it's really important that they have a healthy host. So that way, the mycorrhizal fungi can continue to be healthy and help their host. It's essentially like a win win situation. So as long as the host is doing well, the mycorrhizal fungi will be doing well, and they're, they're passing, you know, water and nutrients and a lot of other things we can get into in a second. And so for me, as as a you know, as more so a citizen scientist, when I think about mycorrhizal fungi, I think about the organisms that are directly interfacing with plant roots and that couldn't survive without the plants being
there. That makes perfect sense. Like you said, the prefix Myco for mushroom, and then rhizo, like the rhizosphere, the classification is itself, those that associate with plants that makes perfect sense and then divided into endo and Ecto.
Yeah, let's Yeah. There's actually, you know, indo and endo and Ecto are the two most common. But there's actually seven different for seven different types of micro. Think
I've heard that before. Can you talk about the other ones? Because I only hear about endo and Ecto mycorrhizal fungi.
Yeah, so I might butcher some of these, but they're Endo, Ecto, Ecto. So Ecto, Endo, there are some this one was really something that fascinated me. There's some varieties of mycorrhizal fungi that have developed a way to depending on the environmental factors, they can form these ectomycorrhizal relationships. They can form endo or they can do both at the same time. Wow. And so you know, starting off the list, then again, we have endo Ecto, Ecto, endo arbitioid, monotropic erosioid and orchidas and the the orchidaeus is the most interesting to me, because these are the ones that help orchids survive in very early stages of their life. Wow.
So they, all they know is that this certain fungi bonds with this species, and they named it's probably, I assume, named that that kingdom just based on the association of that one plant. That's fascinating.
Yeah, it's actually because this one, you know, there's, there's, I I'm not sure there's, I know there's, for sure, hundreds of species of orchids. I'm not sure about 1000s. So much a plant expert, but I know that for all of those different types of orchids, they're going to have their own microbiome, and these their own, like indigenous mycorrhizal fungi that have developed through evolution with them. Wow. And so what, what they found is that, you know, in these large scale grows of orchids, they've found that even if they didn't introduce these mycorrhizal fungi, they're still in their their genetics. And so there's, you know, there's a category of fungi called endo fights. And so these are, these are fungi that live inside of plants, inside of their DNA, and when the plant reproduces, it actually reproduces the plant DNA and the fungi. And so, you know, yeah, it's really fascinating that, you know, without even inoculating, some of these plants, these large scale grows, are seeing that these mycorrhizal fungi are popping up already because of this genetic evolution where they've co adapted to just be together, and because of the diversity in orchids and the importance of the mycorrhizal fungi with orchids, they decided to make their own category. And so those are only found in association with orchids. I don't know. I'm sure they have some other varieties, but for the most part, it's very specific to orchids.
That is fascinating. I didn't know there were so many different types. Um, so cool. So
soon, I'm sure, I'm sure much more to be discovered. You know, Matt powers is someone who I look up to when it comes to soil science, and using a microscope and really understanding what's going on in the soil, and he's learning more and more about, you know, what these relationships look like, and he's able to create diagrams and visual representations of how these things are interacting to give us as growers a better idea of what's actually happening. That's
awesome. I love it, man, yeah, the amazing world of these mycorrhizal species. So you talked about endo and Ecto just really quickly the differences between those two. Do you want to highlight how they react differently?
Yeah, so the endo penetrate the cortical cells of roots, and they form these clusters of hyphae that basically they form these little sacks, and then they have this mutualistic relationship with the plant. So they're exchanging macro really, they're exchanging water, for the most part, and carbon. The fungi needs carbon to continue to reproduce and but it also need. The plant needs some sugars and some of the other smaller nutrients that the fungi can break down through bacteria and then absorb and pass along to the plant. So about 80 to 90% of vascular plants have endo mycorrhizal relationships, and the Ecto mycorrhizal fungi, these form a sheath on the outside of the plants, and they basically, essentially without, without penetrating it. They just form a shell all the way around the plant, the plant root, and that allows the mycelium to break things down and absorb into the plant roots, but without allowing the fungi to penetrate, and that happens with about three to 5% of vascular plants. But these are, these numbers are also based on estimates. So for the most part, I would imagine there's a lot more going on in the soil than we are aware of. Sure,
sure. And I was told that, you know, again, the endo being associated with cannabis. And I didn't know that many plants in general, I didn't know that high of a percentage, but the Ecto mycorrhizal fungi more associating with trees and things of that nature. Is that correct? I've been told, like, what are your plants things like that?
Yes, exactly. The Ecto mycorrhiza have a really they do a really great job at breaking down the lignin and cellular. Those inside these plants. And so the the plant and the fungus, oftentimes, they grow in relationship with each other. And if the plant, say, the tree gets cut down, oftentimes, over the next couple years, you'll see these Ecto mycorrhizal mushrooms start to pop up. So as this tree dies off, the Ecto mycorrhizal fungi that are on the roots as a way to reproduce and continue spreading. They'll form these mushrooms, and hopefully those spores will spread to another seedling that can then hopefully germinate and then start a mutualistic relationship with that seedling as this tree develops.
That's incredible. And the endo not producing those fruiting bodies ever, right?
Yeah. So the the, for the for the most part, the indoor, what we would consider the the fungi that we don't get to see too often. You know, it's stuff that, unless you're pulling out a microscope when you're doing soil samples and studies, you're not going to see these organisms too often, especially when it comes to mushroom you know, mushroom sightings in the cannabis grow, for the most part, you'll see maybe the occasional yellow pot mushroom. It's like a little yellow parasol. But other than that, you know, the the fungal diversity in a cannabis grow is pretty high when you're applying the endo mycorrhizal fungi, but you're not going to be seeing a lot of mushrooms. And so that's that, you know, I've had some cannabis growers who, they've seen a lot of mushrooms in there, they've seen a lot of mushrooms in there grow, and they've thought that, you know, it's been a bad sign of the soil. And so I've had to, I've had to talk with growers and say, you know, it's not a bad sign of your soil. It's actually, it's a sign that your mycorrhizal network is working. And most of the time, when you ask them about how often they see these mushrooms pop up, it's typically one to five days after a watering cycle or a heavy watering cycle. So for the most part, we don't see mushrooms in the grow and when we do, we try and pluck them early, so that way, they don't spread spores on top of our flower. You know, if you're if your plant is flowering, we definitely don't want those mushrooms spreading spores onto the flower, so we always try and tuck them early, and that's not going to negatively impact the mycorrhizal network, because when we take a mushroom from the soil, it's like taking an apple from the tree.
Oh, I've got more questions. I'm gonna bank this question, because I want to stay on this nice path that we're on. So many mushroom questions, so many mushroom questions. But, you know, as cannabis growers, there's a lot of products out there, a lot of the same stuff, to be clear, like there's a lot of, you know, intradices out there, right? That's the species. I believe. That's so, so common. But then there's also different blends. And I guess what I want to know is, as a cannabis grower, why should I be concerned about getting these fungi in my garden? What benefits am I going to see? Why is it important to us?
Yeah, definitely, I will. As a cannabis grower. I think there's for me when I when I first, you know, when we talked about doing this podcast, I thought about it from two different perspectives, and that's the outdoor grower, and that's the indoor grower. And so oftentimes, the outdoor grower is, you know, whether they're growing outdoors in pots or they're growing in soil, they're looking to apply something that is going to help their plant be resilient and the environment and the indoor grower, where they have a little bit more capabilities to control all the environmental factors there may be looking for something that they can see do exactly what it says, if that makes sense, because it's a product with a label and it has a description. And so for if you're a grower and you're interested in using mycorrhizal inoculants, first, you know, kind of define where am I going to be using this? Am I going to be using this on my outdoor plants or my indoor plants? And then from there, you can look at the types of fungi that are in you know, oftentimes, if you turn the label on the backside of the product, it'll list the different species that they offer. You know, the three things that you really want to be looking for is the viability of the spores. You want to make sure that the product, you know, isn't three years old. You want to make sure that you're getting a good product with a good batch date. And by good batch data, I mean something that isn't expired. You want to make sure that the products that you're using are still viable. Because if they're not viable, then you definitely won't see anything. You also want to use something that's concentrated so you can get whether it's at liquid form or, you know, we talked about some some products before the podcast started, that are in powder. You know, those are great as well. But as long as these are concentrated forms of these mycorrhizal fungi. That's really what you're looking for. What
about this Cfu, you know, this unit, the colony forming, unit measurement. Should we concern ourselves with that number? It usually looks pretty high. I don't know what high is really
exactly. Yeah. So I think that, you know, sometimes on the backup products, they they have these ways of like, measuring. Um, whether it's their colony or their propagules or the viable spores. I think it can be kind of distracting as a customer, because you're not really sure what, like, what that means, like, what exactly does that mean, right? And, you know,
does this mean it's extra powerful, it's 100,000 that sounds good. That sounds like a lot.
Yeah, exactly. It sounds like a lot. And so one thing, you know, as as a like, as a mushroom, as a mushroom, like forager, for me, when I think about colonies, I think about, you know, the density of of these networks and of this mycorrhizal fungi. So from the outside, yes, it sounds like, you know, as long as the you would want as high as you could from the outside. But then when you start thinking about, well, which colonies are they putting and are all of these colonies as beneficial to what I need, or are they, are any of them fillers or something like that? So for me, what I I look for not not just viable concentrated, but also look for something that I know is meant specifically for cannabis. You know, if you're looking, if you're looking for a mycorrhizal inoculant, and it's for, you know, like I mentioned earlier about orchids, you know, yes, it's mycorrhizal, but it's not going to form the right Association. And if you're, you know, a vegetable gardener, you might not want to use cannabis product that's been developed for cannabis roots.
Yep, that makes perfect sense, and that's why some blends are so nice, right?
Yeah, blends are really good, and they can help you, as a beginner, get an idea of what will work, then you can adjust from there.
Yeah, absolutely. Or, you know, you pay, you're going to pay for this thing. It's nice, especially, I think if you're growing outdoors and indoors, like you said, Maybe you got the veggie garden outside, and you grow all sorts of stuff. Those micro blends are really, really great. But on the same note, if you get just straight glomus intradices, it's usually cheaper because it's just one product. Really,
the importance of of this mycorrhizal network is to apply it like not only to the root system, but early on in the plant's life, that's really important. So that way, you know, if you're if you're applying, if you're growing indoors, and you've never applied mycorrhizal fungi, and you apply it, you know, the last three weeks of flowering, you're probably not going to see much of a difference, right? But if you start these plants, and you start them on a regiment when they're clones, and then as they go through veg, and then they get to flowering, they're going to have a much stronger, more resilient mycorrhizal network. They're going to be able to withstand a little bit of heat fluctuations or a little bit of nutrient exchange, maybe. And so for for the most part, it's, it's important that you apply early on and directly to the root system if you want to see results.
I've heard that, you know, and even some like pushback from the no till guys that are like, Oh, it's such a waste. If you don't, you know, let it run for months. But I've heard other people say, you know, we can see these relationships establish as early as a few weeks, but they really start to hum along if you let them sit for a few months with these plants now, like, like you said, cannabis is gone so quickly. I mean four weeks veg, as little as eight weeks flower, and it's gone. So you want to get that in early. Very good point. Very good point. And I agree, even getting those established during the seedling phase. Sometimes when I'm going to pop seeds, I'll throw a little bit of liquid micro in my wet paper towel that I popped the seeds in, because why not get that, that relationship kind of forming now, get those microbes communicating now, before it even hits the dirt, that's my theory. Anyways,
yeah, that's, I mean, that's, that's, that's my theory as well. I think that the sooner they can form and establish a connection, the both though, the faster they'll both develop and thrive. And so if I know that both of them are going to be healthy and beneficial, I definitely want to apply early on. And you know when, if you're growing in, if you're growing in pots, it's definitely important to apply early on. But if you're growing in like a living soil bed, then you know, it's not ideal to take out your plants and to rip open that soil and do that. There's other ways of of applying, and that's through, you know, liquid through liquid applicants. But when, for the most part, we're not. When I think about cannabis growing, I think about the growers who are still growing in pots, still growing a little bit of still applying the nutrients through their through their water.
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Yeah. Well, first off, trichoderma is every anyone who's growing mushrooms in a monotub. This is their enemy. So for all these mushroom growers out there, as soon as you said that, you probably winced, like I did, because this is something that when we see in our tubs, it is like the, it's like the one of the worst things that you can see in there, you know, because for as a mushroom grower, you know that you're the organism that you put in there that you want to grow is now competing with a another fungus, and this one, you know, trichoderma, is a common one. We see this oftentimes, you know, outdoors, indoors, for the mushroom growers, when we see this trichoderma in our monotone, we know that we have to restart oftentimes, this organism will establish itself, and then from there, you can try and cut out a little bit of the substrate or spray some hydrogen peroxide, but trichoderma is resilient and it will grow back. So anyone who's growing mushrooms and has had to fight this off, I'm right there with you, but the one thing that I didn't know when I was when I first started was that you can actually take this substrate that's contaminated with trichoderma and amend it into your compost, or amend it as a as like, basically, like a mulch, to your plant as a top, as a top dressing. And you know this trichoderma, it will slowly, if you also water, it will seep into the soil, and it will help stimulate your plant roots, and it will also coexist with a lot of the other, all of the other mycorrhizal fungi that are in there. So it's really interesting, if
you give them time to establish, right? That's okay, that's perfect. That's what I was going to ask. Ask next, that's perfect. Yeah,
exactly, if you give them time to establish. And so the really, the benefit is, if you're growing cannabis and mushrooms, if your mushroom grow contaminates, you can take it out and also amend it into your plants. And so that's really great about it. But for those mushroom growers who are growing and the monotubes, and unfortunately, they're not growing plants, it's something that they know they gotta restart.
Yeah, right. That's, like, your version of root rock, yeah. For for us, we're like, oh, the product was working. So that's that's really interesting, and what you said makes perfect sense, because that's one of the big benefits of adding trichoderma to your soil, is to repel any pathogens that are soil born this. This fungus is so aggressive and takes over the medium that there's really not room for much else. So if you have something nasty, like some sort of water mold that finds its way into your garden, I've had those before, they're the worst. And if you have something like that nasty that comes into your medium, the trichoderma is going to keep that out. So that makes a lot of sense. From, from what you just said, yeah, it
says it's strong, but when it, when it gets in your mushroom monotub, you wish it wasn't that strong,
right, right? Different application. That's so true. And then also it enhances plant growth. That's the other thing about trichoderma is some growers skip the mycorrhiza, only use trichoderma and whatever floats your boat. Man, that's good stuff. Just keep it away from your mushroom blocks. And is that one of the reasons why it's so hard to grow cannabis and mushrooms near each other is because of trichoderma specifically? Yeah, I
think, you know, I think for the most part, when it comes to cannabis cultivation, where we don't really think about isolated organisms. We think. About, we want great diversity. We want to see, you know, in specifically, like with living soil, we have our host plant, our cannabis, but then we have all these small, minor plants as cover crops, and then we have this biodiversity of organisms. And sometimes, you know, EPM, like predatory insects, and there's so much diversity, and the cannabis grow. But when we think about mushroom cultivation, it's all about that single organism. So all we care about is, you know, if we're growing blue oysters, for example, we don't want to see any other fungi or any other insects or any plants. We only want to see, right this, this Blue Oyster. And so it's kind of like two opposite sides of the coin. When we think about living soil and Canvas cultivation, we love to see diversity. We love to see all the different variety and how they're coexisting and interacting. But on the opposite end, when it comes to mushroom cultivation, we just we really don't like that. We don't like the diversity. We only want our organism to grow and to be the only successful one
there? Good point. There are no beneficial insects in the mushroom grow. Yeah, it's like, what are you doing in here? That's very, very cool. Okay, so that was the first thing I wanted to talk about was, was trichoderma, and I'm a fan of it, you know. Keep it away from those mushroom blocks, though, and and the other thing I was gonna ask you was, maybe the most common mushroom question that I get in cannabis cultivation. I don't want to say consultation, but helping, helping my listeners and helping my members. And one of the things that they asked me is, what's this mushroom that just popped up out of my soil? And when I pass it along to yourself, or, you know, Mary Beth Sanchez or someone like this, a lot of times they respond, that's an inky cap mushroom. An inky cap mushroom. Um, what? What are these mushrooms? Why are they so common? And I keep seeing them in cannabis grows. Can you tell us a little bit about them?
Yeah, so inky cap mushrooms, they're, they're all over the world. They're some of the most common mushrooms. And they, you know, they got their name because of the way that they start to, I think it's called de la quest, where they start to ooze and turn into a black liquid. This is a mushroom that, back in the day, was collected and actually used for its ink properties. So people actually collect this mushroom and strain it after it's created that black ooze, and then would use it to write on on paper. So that's kind of where that name originated. One thing that's interesting about the inky cap so is that if you were to eat some of them and also drink alcohol, it can make you severely ill. So there's a inky caps refers to a group of mushrooms, not a specific mushroom. And so, ah, good, yeah, good to know. And so there are some inky caps that are like the alcohol inky cap that you do not want to mix. And there are some inky caps that don't really do anything if you if you drink alcohol, as when you consume them. And so it's really interesting that you know these mushrooms are in the same category, they can have these different effects. And that's why it's so important to know the mushroom species before you eat it, or before you dry it out. And because most of the time these mushrooms, you won't be able to tell what they look like when they're dry
Right, right? And it's classified based on this ability to produce ink, right? So it's probably going to have a lot of that's almost like, if we took cannabis and classified it on its color, right? Like, oh, this is purple. This is Canada. This is cannabis, purple liquor. Yes, you know what I mean Exactly.
And so it's kind of a it's kind of a tricky thing to do, because then we just categorize all these mushrooms, and we don't really know how to define them and separate them without, you know, using a guide. But for the most part, there are no inky caps that people are eating. There's nothing that is there's no poisonous inky caps, unless you're also, you know, consuming alcohol. But there's nothing beneficial from these mushrooms that people are going out and collecting these are something that we see whenever it rains. You know, we say when it rains, it spores, because about two days after the rain, you start to see a lot of mushrooms.
Makes a lot of sense. And yeah, I do see these in my outdoor garden popping up out of the side of the pot, something like that. I guess that solves the question. You said that it's one of the most common ones, so that's why I'm sad a lot online. Have
you heard of the yellow parasol? I don't think I have. So this is another really common mushroom that grows in house plants, and this is probably it's also called the plant pot. Dapper lane. Ooh, soprinus, Bernie, balmy eye.
You just pull that from your head.
No, I looked it up. It
was like, Holy crap, man. That was impressive. I gotta say. I mean, the Latin stuff always impresses me. Okay, so first of all, I'm getting actual parasols so I could get a nice umbrella for 5999 Okay, here we go. Yellow parasol. Here we go. Oh, plant pot, mushroom. Yeah, you. It. Oh, these are awesome. I have seen these around. I have totally seen those. This
is the most common one that I come across, other than the inky cap.
Oh, yeah, I've definitely seen it before. And this is just happening because it's coming in on our compost. Probably when someone put together this cannabis soil mix, they had some nice compost that was rich and all sorts of stuff. And this was in it,
yep, and it's really common. It's not going to negatively affect your plants. It's not out competing your other mycorrhizal fungi. It's just growing in there along with it, and it's actually helping to increase, like, soil aeration and water availability for the plant,
nice. It's just doing its thing, and that's usually right now with everyone else? Yeah, I usually tell people, you know, don't worry about that inky cap, even though I feel like they usually die pretty quickly, like they'll be there and then they'll be gone, you know, they'll get hit by light or the sun, and they'll just die from what I've seen it. Yes, yes,
they're there, then they're gone very, very quickly, especially if the sun is on them, they'll, they'll turn to ooze within an
hour, Inky cat mush. I'm gonna gather some and get my feather Quill and get to
work, start Hey and and send a carrier pigeon to my house. Yes, I'll write you back.
100% I'll receive your response in four months time. Okay, so let's talk about this indoor versus outdoor. These, you know, these mushrooms that are prevalent, these mushrooms that are strong. What about the wild mushrooms out there that are everywhere, versus the ones that were getting stabilized? You know, these bottle born ones, these bagged ones. Talk to me about Native microbes and how they differ from the ones that we buy.
Yeah, so the native microbes is something that I've really been trying to promote with the living soil and the organic gardeners, people who are growing outdoors, and instead of, you know, buying fertilizers, they can actually just, you know, propagate some of the microorganisms that are already floating around in the air. And so when it comes to, you know, growing outdoors, I highly recommend that you learn how to collect your own IMO. And you know, you can do this based on, like, some of the Korean Natural Farming techniques, or you can do it just by putting out some of your substrate from your mushroom grow, and then you'll start to see all these other organisms grow on your substrate, competing. And so for me as a as an outdoor organic gardener, I would prefer to use my my native microorganisms. But if I was growing something indoors, whenever we're growing indoors, you know, the bottled, the bottled, IMO, is really good because it's something that is meant specific for our plants, or it's meant specific for cannabis. And so we know that it's going to have a direct, a direct relationship with the plant. And so we know that the product was developed through studies to have a positive impact on the plant or with the plant, whereas with these indigenous microorganisms, there probably aren't specific studies on these microbes, right? But there are, you know, what we would consider observational, observational things that you can go out and talk with organic gardeners and say, Are you collecting? IMO, how is it helping you? And they may be able to show you how it's helping. But if you ask them, well, which microbes are, are the native ones and which ones aren't, it would be very difficult to tell,
right? And who knows how many countless species are out there, like you're saying, that have just slightly adapted for this environment or for this plant on the other side of that, you know, planting native plants, and the relationship between these native microbes and their native plants, very, very cool, how it kind of works both ways. And I think that's probably what may account for some of the changes in expression. So if you take cannabis that was, you know, bred and kept in a different area, but you bring it and you plant it in Oklahoma dirt. Over the next 1020, 3040, years, that plant is going to change. It's going to change for a variety of reasons, but I think one of the reasons, maybe a major reason, is that there's native microbes that are interacting with this plant, capable of interacting with its DNA, as you said, in the past, and and changes it. That's what made Maui Wowie. Maui Wowie. Someone was telling me, you know, Maui Wowie is just Oaxacan that got brought to Hawaii, and 40 years later, it was totally different from the volcanic rock and the sun and the and the microbes I assume.
Yeah, I know. And that just, I always love to hear stories like that, because it's a great way to be appreciative of the genetic diversity that cannabis and a lot of other, you know, just all the other organisms on planet Earth have, they all have this amazing resiliency to change, to their environment, to make it work. And I think that specifically with cannabis, you know, we see, we've seen, you know, like, you know. The purple Hindu Kush. And you know, a lot of the strains that come out of the Middle East, when they're grown indoors, they're, you know, they sometimes they resemble what they looked like, but most of the time they don't, and that's because they're not under this incredibly intense sun like they are outdoors, you know. So I think it's so interesting when we grow the Landry strained indoors, and it's the same thing with the native mushrooms. When you take a native mushroom that's used to growing outdoors and you start growing it indoors, you're going to see a lot of different phenotypic expression, right,
right? Is that another reason why? Like, this is something I've been told and you can correct me if it's not true, but I've been told that, like, a lot of these microbes, because they are so, like, wild and free that they can't be bottled a lot of times, the one that we've the ones that we've been able to stabilize, are few in number, is my understanding, versus a lot of these wild ones, you can't really recreate in the lab,
yeah, or or not even recreate, but it's just hard to isolate them, because A lot of these microbes going to grow so closely together, or they're so these micro and by microbes, I just mean these mycorrhizal fungi, but they're just so small. And it's we still, you know, soil science is developing at a lot slower pace than, say, our understanding of space in the universe, and so I think that the more we understand about soil science, the more we'll be able to eventually propagate or isolate and then propagate these organisms. But right now, for the most part, we all we get to see is this kind of this outside perspective where we can try and isolate it, but sometimes it might not even be isolated. It might actually be two or three organisms all grow them together. So true. I don't think there's, I don't think there's anything wrong with it. I think that, you know, when we think about growing in a budget friendly way, if, if we can leave all the organisms in there and they're all happy together, there's no reason to put in the time and labor to isolate them. But if you're growing indoors, then you definitely want to make sure that if you're spending your money, that it's on exactly what is going to help your plans, instead of kind of a shot in the dark.
I totally agree. And like you said, a budget friendly way this IMO stuff is great because you can go collect the stuff for free, you know.
Yeah, that's, that's it, and it, and it's actually what's going to help you and your native environment. So if you're growing outdoors using native IMO, you know, foliar application. This is exactly what your plant needs to thrive in the environment you're in. If you're growing a plant you know that, you know, like, for example, the Maui Wowie from Hawaii, you're growing it here in Oklahoma, even if you give it, you know, the same love and care that it was receiving over there, and the the temperature, the environment, there's so many different factors. And even the mycorrhizal fungi are going to be different because of the soil. And so what's what is going to be dominant there might not even exist here?
Yeah, that's exactly right. And, you know, it's kind of an unsatisfying answer, but a lot of the time, that's what I that's the answer I give when people ask what products to buy. A lot of it is wallet dependent, because people will ask me, like, can I just mix all this shit together, like you say, but you said biodiversity is great on your podcast, and that the more the merrier. So should I just get all of these products and alternate them? And I'm like, it's really budget dependent. I don't think that's a bad idea. I think it is a good idea to either, on a budget friendly note, get some aquarium water for those aquatic microbes and that bacteria, or maybe buy yourself some fish shit if you don't have an aquarium, or you're in an apartment or whatever, and there's your aquatic microbes, and then get yourself some trichoderma and some and some mycorrhizal fungi. Get some glomus in there, and the more the merrier, but it comes at a cost. Eventually, you're gonna be spending a crap ton of money. And, you know, maybe, maybe you're successful in business, and that's no problem, but other people are growing on a dime, and that's where it's like, okay, can we get some aquatic bacteria from aquarium water? Can we go collect some indigenous microorganisms so you don't have to pay for fungi and do this thing for free, or next to free. You know what I mean?
Yeah, that's exactly who I you know, that's who I want to inspire. I want to inspire the growers who have been feeling like they can't do it, and this is all they needed to hear to take that first step. And so I really want to encourage the growers out there, if you're you know, if you're struggling with your plants outdoors, look into collecting your native microorganisms and applying them. And if you have any questions about it, definitely reach out to Jordan. You can also reach out to me, because we want to see more growers be successful indoors and outdoors.
I love it. Yeah, definitely listen. I'm not the IMO guy. I love hearing about it. I would love to do a collection of my own, to be honest. But it's really cool what guys like you are doing, and all the KNF guys, very, very cool stuff I follow a lot. Mostly,
I've learned a lot from OK, calyx and Brandon rust so bukashi earthworks, so both of those companies. Or both of those are great educators who are doing great things with native microorganisms and plant and soil chemistry. Yeah,
that's what's up. I love to hear that. Man. Love to hear that. Okay, wow. We just flew through this interview. Let's just wrap up with anything else you want to say about fungi interfacing with plants. I or just any way that you can have them play well together. I love what you said earlier about taking your trichoderma tainted blocks and adding them to your garden. That was really cool, but I
got something better for you. Oh, hit me. Hit me. Okay, so I'm sure some of your growers, or even you've heard about these, these CO two blocks,
oh yeah, these exhale bags. Tell me about those? Yes,
so exhale bags. What are exhale bags? What are mushroom bags? Well, one thing that's really interesting about fungi that a lot of you know, plant growers don't really think about too much, and this is why they've been able to create that product, is that with fungi breathing oxygen and reproducing CO two, plants, breathing in that CO two and producing oxygen. They complete the air cycle. And so they're they're able to help each other breathe, help each other respirate and pass the end like, essentially grow better together. And so what we're finding is that, like, whether it's a whether it's through an exhale bag, or it's just growing any other type of mushroom. When the mushroom breathes, your plant is breathing it in. So these exhale bags is a mushroom bag that's created by a company in Montana, and they isolated in a they basically isolated a strain of Turkey Tail that doesn't produce the mushroom itself, and that mushroom, and since it never grows, all it does is breathe and eat the nutrients inside the bag. Was that how it works? Now that this organism is eating all this nutrients in the bag and it's breathing, what they recommend is applying the they just put the bag inside of the grow. And so I always thought it was really interesting that you could grow your whether it's cannabis or just plants and mushrooms in the same tent, but you just don't want your mushrooms to be you don't want your mushroom bag to actually produce mushrooms. If that makes sense. I didn't
know that it was a Turkey Tail that didn't fruit, and that's how those bags works. I always wondered that. I was like, Where are the that's amazing.
I looked into the patent. Of course you did. Because I'm like, there's this doesn't make sense, because I bought one of their bags and I set it outside for six months in my compost, just waiting for it to do something, and it never did anything. And I was waiting for the mycelium to get infected with something, and it was like the weirdest thing. So it kind of really sparked my interest in what they were doing. And they actually, you know, they've been doing it for a long time. They have a couple of different patents. They have patents on the bag design, patent on a bunch of the different things. But for the most part, if you're grow, if you're a cannabis or plant grower indoors, and you need more CO two, you're not going to be putting a bunch of mushroom bags in there. But if you're a hobbyist and you have a growth at home, or you have a little three by five or four by eight, you could put an exhale bag or another mushroom bag in there that would help your plants breathe on these commercial facilities. They're definitely not doing that? Yeah, that's
true. I want to get some mushrooms going or something like that. Now, these XL bags are a hot topic in the cannabis world, and I'll tell you why Jacob they're and you know what? This has kind of changed a little bit. There's a lot of argument over using them in a ventilated space, because if you're sucking the air out constantly, like you do in a Grow Tent, then people say, Oh, they're only effective in sealed rooms, yada yada yada. I'm not so sure. I've seen growers have them amongst their plants, and now that we're under LED lighting, let me see what my fan is set my outtake fan is set to three out of 10. So is the CO two gonna have a chance to affect them? I mean, I think that it's worth a try. I'm gonna, I'm gonna experiment with this myself, because otherwise you got to get, like, a CO two tank, and that's not feasible. If I could just have some mushrooms doing this job, that would be dope. Is there other mushrooms that I can grow? Like, what if I get some mushroom blocks of Pia pinos and other stuff, if I put those in my tent? Is that going to make a noticeable impact on the CO two, or is it probably going to be negligible?
Yeah, I know it, if you So, for example, you know there's mushroom growers that basically they're in their incubation tent, all they have is shelves filled with mycelium bags that are colonizing. And these things are producing so much CO two that they actually have, they actually start to develop weird and start and morph into different shapes. And so it's definitely something that if you're going to be applying these mushroom bags into your grow, you want to make sure that they're not actually fruiting the mushrooms. Because if they're producing the mushrooms, they're going to put those. Bores all over your vegetables, or all over your cannabis. So yeah, we definitely want to make sure that if you are, if you are applying it, it's in a spawn bag. Because what a spawn for? I don't know if I've talked to you about this, Jordan, but we have two two steps. We have a spawn bag and a substrate bag. So when the the fungus is in the spawn bag. It's just colonizing. It's not going to fruit, and that is when you would want to put it inside the Grow Tent. But once the organism is fruiting inside the substrate bag, you definitely don't want it in there, and that's because of the spores that could spread
bust on your flowers. Okay, that makes sense. Wow, man. This was a dope episode. I want to make sure we give you time here at the end, of course, the okay mushroom festival going down October 15, I will see you there. You can use code grow cast 10 to grab your tickets. Where else can people find you Oklahoma fungi? And what do you got available on the site? All the fun stuff you have up there,
yeah. So you can check us out on Oklahoma fungi.com we're on Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok, YouTube, and I think it's called x now instead of Twitter, but yeah, we're on all those different sites. We're all we're always trying to interact. I'm trying to get more on Discord for the festival. If you want to purchase tickets, go to okmushfest.com but if you want to purchase things like mushroom spores, or you want to purchase monotub kits, like grain bags, all that good stuff, you can definitely send me an email or go to our website, Oklahoma funguard.com,
love it, man. Love the kits. Everything you got going up on there, a bunch of species. I gotta get growing some here. If
you decide to purchase a VIP bag, just know you're going to get a ton of free jobs.
Holy crap. That's awesome. That is really, really cool, man. Thank you so much, Jacob for all your education, for coming on the show. I know the members love you. So this audience, this audience, first time appearance is going to be a hit. So thank you very much, my friend, and we'll have you back on the show real soon. Okay, awesome. Can't wait. Much love y'all, all right. Much love indeed. That's all for today. Thank you so much everybody we'll see on the next grow cast. Don't touch that dial. See everything at growcast podcast.com, in the meantime, and come over and check us out. Membership. Growcast podcast.com/membership, that's all this is Oklahoma fungi and Jordan River signing off, saying, be safe and grow smarter. That's our show. Thank you so much for tuning in. Thank you. Everybody. Be sure to see all the action at growcast podcast.com join up membership for hundreds of hours of bonus content before we wrap this show, though. Shout out to rooted leaf nutrients, perfect with your blue mat system. Rootedleaf.com code growcast for 20% off with carbon heavy, no pH, needed nutrient line. I use rooted leaf in my garden. I absolutely love it. Their foliar sprays are incredible. And most importantly, I am not pH. And you start with filtered water, you add the nutrients. They're loaded with everything you need to feed your fungi, like we discussed on today's episode. They're loaded with all types of beneficial bacteria. And you don't pH, you just water it in it's absolutely incredible. You're going to love it. Rootedleaf.com, code growcast for 20% off your rooted leaf nutrients. If you've liked the episodes with Nick, you're going to love the product that he's crafted. And let me know how you like it. Go ahead and write us and tell us how you like the rooted leaf. They're great in a hand watering setup. They're great in a blue mat or drip system. Check them out today and use code growcast for a whopping 20% off. Thank you to rooted leaf, our partners. All right, everyone, that's it for today's show. I am currently gearing up for the breeder class this weekend. You can come see me in Virginia. Ryzo Rich and I are at Homegrown VA, Richmond, and we are at grow depot, Virginia Beach. I'm so excited to see you guys there. I love my va gromies. So you can find all that at growcast podcast.com/classes, and after that, I've got some time off. I'm going to be kicking it, working on the show, working on the back end, working on a new website, and getting ready for Nova cup, November 11. That's in Northern Virginia, and that'll be the last one before I head to see my family. So a lot on the plate. Grateful for every one of you members, grateful for helping people grow, having the honor of helping people grow. So stay tuned. Don't touch that dial. I'll be here. I'm not going anywhere. See you next time. Everybody. Have a great day. Bye. Bye.
You know, we say when it rains, it spores, because about two days after the rain, you start to see a lot of mushrooms. I.