Sawdust From Rubber Trees

[MrOdyssey]

Hello all,

Do any of you happen to know where there is a sawmill that works specifically with rubber trees? One as close to Ubon Ratchathani as possible. I want to do some trials using it as substrate for cultivating mushrooms. They say nothing is free anymore in Thailand, so if anyone knows the cost, please let me know.

Thanks

[IsaanAussie]

As a matter of fact I do know of such a sawmill. Unfortunately their entire rubber tree sawdust output is under permanent contract to the local rubber band factory. You know Ody, you really are sh1t out of luck because this contract has only just been placed. They used to sell to the local "nodder" factory but they got too many complaints about itchy genitalia.

[MrOdyssey]

Thanks, IsaanAussie. Well, I guess I've made a fair enough attempt to get "sustainable" sawdust. Now with a clean concience I can use the free sawdust still obtainable in Vientiane, probably from trees illegally harvested. I'm actually planning on using coffee waste (pulp) but I won't have any until the harvest begins in November.

[IsaanAussie]

I have tried rice straw, rice hulls, and compost in my grow bags. All going well. I have added some of my fertiliser pellets to both straw and hulls to provide nutrients. Bulk pasteurising in hot water and that yields a healthy population of IMO friendlys that survive the temperature, they are getting brewed up with EM and molasses. So as far as sustainable is concerned, I don't even throw out the bath water. 5555

[MrOdyssey]

I'll be starting by buying a good-looking king oyster mushroom (Pleurotus eryngii) at Lotus Tesco and cloning it. They are suited to the cool climate of the Plateau. The ones I've seen are imported from China or come down from Chiangmai. It was the same at the market in Vientiane. I'm being given a 50kg bag of Mulato grass seed which is being taken out of circulation which I'll experiment with as spawn grain. I'll also try sorghum and rice grain. Then I'll try innoculating supplemented sawdust bags. At this point, I'm just going to try and see if I can do these things without contamination problems. I'm hoping that I won't have to buy a laminar flow HEPA filter cabinet (30,000 baht). Slobs like me and sterile rooms weren't made for each other. When (if?) I master the sterile poceedures, I buy proper cultures from Japan. What kind of mushrooms are you doing? Straw? Oyster?

[David48]

I don't even throw out the bath water. 5555

Speaking of the unused bathwater ... an unashamed plug for another Thread I did recently ... how-tight-is-your-girlfriend

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[IsaanAussie]

I'll be starting by buying a good-looking king oyster mushroom (Pleurotus eryngii) at Lotus Tesco and cloning it. They are suited to the cool climate of the Plateau. The ones I've seen are imported from China or come down from Chiangmai. It was the same at the market in Vientiane. I'm being given a 50kg bag of Mulato grass seed which is being taken out of circulation which I'll experiment with as spawn grain. I'll also try sorghum and rice grain. Then I'll try innoculating supplemented sawdust bags. At this point, I'm just going to try and see if I can do these things without contamination problems. I'm hoping that I won't have to buy a laminar flow HEPA filter cabinet (30,000 baht). Slobs like me and sterile rooms weren't made for each other. When (if?) I master the sterile poceedures, I buy proper cultures from Japan. What kind of mushrooms are you doing? Straw? Oyster?

I grow straw mushrooms naturally on straw bales every year, as the wife says, "He just come by myself!". This year I will get a bit more serious with the bales. My main push is Milky Mushrooms. Used about 30Kg of sorghum based spawn seed to date and about the same to go. Using 12" by 18" plastic bags. I have been pasteurising the straw and rice hull substrates but use my compost straight out of the box without a problem.

Like you cleanliness (sterility) can stay closer to Godliness than me. The only naked flame around here is the missus! I spend weeks developing a compost full of live beneficial IMO's why should I kill them off just to promote another fungus that lives happily with them. I do not have the scientific credentials but I do know that you kill pathogens with heat. Let the strong survive!

[IsaanAussie]

If you check the thread on Milky's there are some good photos. Hey Ody, next time you are down this way I will give you a "Leo" grow box to take north with you. Culture away chum. When you get you Agar plates happening you can return the favour.

[MrOdyssey]

Hello IsaanAussie,

Thanks for the suggestion about the "milky" mushroom thread. I just said hello to Mr. Packdee, who I actually discovered a few days ago looking for culture sources. Perhaps we should have a "farmers' meeting" at his farm stay? These are warm weather shrooms, so I'm interested in them for the family in Vientiane. I have a copy (kindle) of Stamets' "Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms," which is sort of the shroomery bible, and I'm interested in your more natural method, too. I'd like to mix the spent mushroom substrate from normal cultivated mushrooms with pasturized coffee pulp, spead it in rows between my coffee trees and use his "spore-mass innoculation" technique. You won't know exactly when they'll fruit, but in the meantime it'll act as mulch. Even if they don't look pretty, I suspect that the few free-range pigs I'm planning on raising (maybe 20 or 30 at a time on my 2 hectares, fenced in with electic fencing), would love them and help fertilize the areas, too.

[IsaanAussie]

To me the environment you are growing in dictates the degree of sterility you can achieve. I control the naturally occurring biology in the pig sty to a certain level with EM but it would be pointless to work in a pressurised box to get bags filled and spawn set only to poke a few breather holes in the bag and set them on the floor in the open. I watched a pile of videos from India and they fill bags and handle seed spawn on farm. The only thing close to contamination protection around in a turban.

[MrOdyssey]

Yeah, once you get to the point where you are innoculating bags, all you really can do is be as careful as you can, it seems. I suppose if I was doing mushrooms in Ubon I'd just buy the spawn as you did, but I've got to learn how to do it from scratch. I'm enjoying the preparation-- I've emptied 11 Sangsom bottles (300ml) so far. I think I can fit 2 dozen or so at a time in my pressure cooker/autoclave. I know I can get ahold of plenty of them, but I like making it personal.