I Tested 8 Mushroom Growing Methods at Home and Ranked Them Best to Worst

So, at this point, everyone is collecting piles of cardboard that they normally just toss out. What if I told you I'm taking that same cardboard and using it to grow delicious gourmet mushrooms? I mean, come on. These beautiful king oyster mushrooms were grown on Amazon boxes. And this is actually just one of eight methods that I use to grow mushrooms at my studio in such abundance that I don't need to buy them from the store anymore. And today I'm not only going to be showing you how each of these methods work, but I'll also be ranking them from F tier to S tier to really figure out which is the absolute best option for you to grow an abundance of mushrooms at home. All right, so we're going to start off with

the easiest mushroom method on this entire list, which is growing mushrooms in wood chips. And this method is especially great if you already use wood chips in your garden like I do, but this could really be done in any standard garden mulch that isn't dyed. And they are just the absolute best garden material because they hold a ton of moisture and over time they slowly break down into a rich compost. But while they're breaking down, they're also a massive carbon source, which is exactly what mushrooms feed off of. Now, the easiest mushrooms to grow this way are wine caps. These things are insanely aggressive colonizers and can handle a lot of different climates and also grow

really well in mixed wood chips since a lot of the time multiple trees are being ground up in one batch of wood chip. And Ideally, you want a fully to partially shaded area of your garden. Although, I've had plenty of success as well in full sun areas. You just have to patch those mushrooms right on time before the sun dries them out. And I usually do little patches all throughout the garden to increase my success rate. And that way, they can spread in these patches over time. Now, the time to harvest is going to be dependent on the mushroom species and your environment that you're growing in. It can take anywhere from a couple months to over a year before you actually get mushrooms. And I'll be very

honest, this is the least predictable method on this list because there's just so many outdoor variables. But the reason I still love it is because it takes almost no effort. You spend like 5 minutes throwing some spawn in wood chips and then one day after a rainstorm, boom, massive wine cap mushrooms exploding out of your garden. And for growing mushrooms and wood chips, it's the cheapest and maybe easiest method to do, but I found over the years it's the least reliable. you're just kind of planting and hoping you get mushrooms one day. So, this is coming in at the C tier. All right, method number two is one of my absolute favorites, which is the traditional Japanese technique of growing mushrooms on locks. And it's just one of the

simplest and most satisfying ways to grow mushrooms at home. The hardest part by far is just sourcing the actual locks. And different mushroom species prefer different types of trees. You can just look up a compatibility chart online. I've linked one below to figure out the best pairing. And at this point, I've just become a log hunter. If I see a fallen tree or a pile of logs on the side of the road, I'm immediately pulling out my iPhone to identify the species to see if it's good for growing mushroom. And the absolute king of log grown mushrooms is the shiakei. This is what they're mainly doing in Japan. But I am starting to experiment with some other varieties. This season, I

inoculated some logs with chicken of the wood spawn, which I'm still currently waiting on them to fruit. And for the logs themselves, I usually aim for sections around 2 to 4 ft long and 4 to 6 in thick, which is big enough to get years of fruiting off one log, but still manageable to move around and work with. Then all you have to do is drill a bunch of holes throughout the logs and you inoculate them using either plug spawn, which you would hammer in, or sawdust spawn, which you would use one of these plunger tools to get into the log. Then after that, you seal those holes up with some food grade wax to lock in the moisture and protect the spawn from any critters. and then it's just a waiting

game. Out of all the methods on this list, this one takes the longest because we are dealing with solid hardwood. For me, my first shiitake logs took about a year and a half before they finally fruited. And that seems like an insane amount of time to wait. But one day, after a good rain, you walk outside and like magic, you suddenly see those little tiny mushroom pins forming on the bark. And then just a few days later, boom, fresh shiake mushrooms growing right out of the logs. And honestly, these outdoor grown mushrooms are incredible. That cracked exterior that you see here on the mushroom caps is happening from the constant starting and stopping of the growing process caused

by outdoor temperature fluctuations. And these cracked ones are super prized selling for insanely high prices in Japan. But ultimately, the cold weather makes these mushrooms a little sweeter and a little deeper in flavor. And the craziest part is that with basically zero additional effort, the logs can keep fruiting every single year. sometimes multiple times a season for years and years until those mushrooms fully break down those logs completely. All right, so for the ranking, the biggest setback is, of course, space, but honestly, you don't need that much space. I got for this in the last video.

Maybe a fire escape isn't the safest place to put some mushroom logs, but the point was you don't need space to grow a ton of mushrooms. So, shiake logs are definitely S tier, baby. Mushroom heaven. All right, moving right on to number three, which is a method for growing mushrooms that I would imagine most people don't even know is possible. And it might just be the most underrated method in this entire video, which is growing mushrooms directly in your garden beds. And the reason this method works so well is thanks to the sponsor of today's video, Norpore, and their plant and grow mushroom blocks. And what's really cool is I have been using Norpore products for at least the last 5

years. and they've really been the main reason for all of my mushroom success here at the studio. And these are their plant and grow blocks which come in a ton of different varieties. I personally like trying out a bunch just to see how they grow and how of course they taste. And these grow blocks are already fully colonized with the mushroom mycelium. So you just pick the mushroom you want to grow and it's literally as simple as removing the block from the bag, placing it directly into your garden bed and covering it up. And you don't need any special compost or wood chips. We're talking directly into your existing garden soil, just like you were planting a bulb or another vegetable. And once

the blocks are planted, just like the rest of my garden, I like to give them a nice layer of mulch on top to keep in that moisture. And since mushrooms prefer growing in shade, you could also grow these directly alongside with other vegetables, which could provide some of that natural shade for the mushrooms. But for me, since it was early spring when I planted these, it wasn't quite warm enough for other veggies. So, I did pick a garden bed that already has a lot of natural shade. But for some extra protection, I also threw a shade cloth over that bed. And it's honestly crazy how well these blocks work. For the last 2 to 3 months, after planting these in the spring, I have been constantly

harvesting large flushes of mushrooms every single week. And it's just so fun to walk into your garden and you start seeing these mushrooms popping up. And then a few days later, you're ready to harvest fresh, delicious mushrooms. And you should get a few rounds of harvest from each mushroom block. But what's really great about this method is that even after the mushroom blocks are fully spent, they continue to just break down into the soil. So at this point, you've basically just added a huge amount of organic matter and fungal life directly into your garden beds, which is really going to help feed and improve your soil over time. All right, so obviously the biggest drawback of this

method is the price. You got to buy the blocks. But if you're looking for a very easy method, this one is amazing and the abundance is insane. I've had to dry mushrooms, all different varieties for those months when I can't grow mushrooms. And then this is crazy abundance here. Look at these mushroom cubes. I'm going to explain this in an upcoming video, but basically I cook down mushrooms in some butter, blend them up. Now I have these amazing mushroom cubes. Imagine throwing that in a pasta. Come on. Now, taking all those things into account, I am going with a tier for growing mushrooms in garden beds. And we're moving right on to another outdoor method, which is growing mushrooms in an outdoor mushroom tent.

Now, this right here is actually a new product from Northport called the Micosphere. And while it's definitely not necessary to grow good mushrooms, as you saw in the last method, it does add another level of environmental control that can improve your success growing mushrooms and also extend your season just like growing in a greenhouse. So, the base of the system is a steel garden bed that you can fill with compost, wood chips, soil, pretty much any growing medium you want. Then, you have a metal frame that attaches to the base, which has built-in irrigation tubing connected to an automated misting system. For my setup, I filled my bed up with some local compost mix that I get from a

horse farm around me, which is super heavy in carbon. It's about 90% carbon, and the rest is horse manure, which when composted down adds a ton of great nutrients to the compost. I popped in some of those same plant and grow blocks, but I'm also using this tent for my shiake logs and my mushroom buckets, which I'm going to talk about in a second. So, whenever I start seeing some pinning, I'll move them inside the tent to not only protect them from insects and critters, but that misting system is going to give them more consistent humidity, which is crucial during that fruing time. So, obviously, this is a bigger investment more for the mushroom crazies like myself. You don't need a

mushroom tent outside to grow great mushrooms. But just like my greenhouse, it gives me more control. I can extend the season, which means more abundance. So, taking all those things into account, I'll give this thing I'll go B tier. All right. So, that takes us right to the last outdoor growing method, which is growing mushrooms in compost buckets. And these right here, these be look at these things. Beautiful pink oysters. Talk about abundance. This was the second flush on my recent compost bucket. Now, I found one of the best factors about growing outdoors is that you don't have to worry as much about perfect sanitation. Nature's going to do a much better job of balancing things

out outside. Once you move indoors, though, it becomes a completely different game. Now, for the growing medium I'm going to use in these buckets, I'm using that same carbon heavy compost mix from the outdoor mushroom tent. And then I'm also adding about 10% straw that I'm going to soak. And this is going to lighten things up as well and just add more carbon. And when growing in buckets, I do find oyster mushrooms are one of the easiest mushrooms to grow. So, I'm going to be using some pink oyster sawdust spawn. And I'm only using about 1/3 of the block for the entire bucket. So, one of these mushroom blocks can get you about three to four mushroom buckets, which is a great deal. And I'll just mix

everything together really thoroughly. And over here, I've got my mushroom bucket, which is basically just a standard 5gallon bucket with some holes drilled in the side. I'll give that a nice rinse off. Then I'm going to pack in that mushroom mixture, trying not to make it super tight, but also not too loose. And then I'll throw a cap on it. And since it was early spring, I did keep the bucket inside my greenhouse just to help speed up colonization with a little extra warmth. Then about 2 weeks later, you could already start seeing that white mycelium spreading through the bucket. And then after a couple weeks, it's going to continue to spread. And that bucket should be fully

colonized with the mushroom mycelium, which is when you can start looking out for those tiny little mushrooms pinning from the holes. And this is the stage when consistent moisture becomes way more important. So I move the bucket into my mushroom tent where the automated misting system could keep those humidity levels stable. But honestly, if you don't have a tent set up, you could just hose the bucket down regularly while those mushrooms are fruing. And then after that, it's basically just checking in on them every day. cuz if you're growing oyster mushrooms, things are going to pop off super quickly.

All right, so this one was a bit of an experiment. I had never tried compost in one of these buckets, and the results shocked me. Second flush of mushrooms. Some of the most beautiful specimens I've ever seen. And I have a big pile of compost sitting over there. So, I could see myself just continuing to do this throughout the entire year to have consistent mushrooms all year long. Definitely go an A tier with that one. So, we've come to one of my favorite rooms in the entire studio, my indoor grow station to talk about different methods for growing mushrooms inside.

We've got seedlings sprouting everywhere thanks to Carly, which are going to go outside very soon. We've got the humidor for those cigars that you saw, plus tobacco aging in there. But for this video, what's most important is this mushroom tent right here. And that brings us into method five. Growing mushrooms in mushroom tents or Martha tents they're called in the mushroom world. And I just found this out. They're called Martha tents because the original mushroom DIYers use the Martha Stewart little green houses that they converted into mushroom grow stations. And a mushroom tent is going to be of course the best option for people who

don't have growing space outside plus people who want to grow mushrooms year round like myself. Now these tents are super simple to set up. You connect them to an automated humidifier because mushrooms of course need really high humidity levels to properly fruit. And you also need an exhaust fan system to remove that excess carbon dioxide that's produced in mushroom growing. Plus, it's going to push out stale air. But most importantly, mushrooms produce a ton of spores. That's how they reproduce. And you don't want to be breathing in those spores. You want to ventilate them to the outdoors. Now, the main way I grow mushrooms in these tents is with fruing blocks. But I have grown mushrooms in

buckets indoors using 100% straw with some grain spawn and it was successful. But doing everything inside was just such a freaking mess. And now that I've had so much success with the outdoor mushroom buckets, I'll definitely be sticking to that. So I'll give a quick C tier for indoor mushroom buckets. But of course these fruing blocks, there's no setup and they work extremely well in these Martha tents. Now, after that first flush of mushrooms, depending on the species, you're most likely going to get another flush, maybe even a third flush. Those second and third flushes are generally smaller. A lot of times, what I like to do after getting that first really nice flush is I'll just

then plant them right into my garden into some wood chips or into a bed. This way, I can get more flushes without really worrying about them. And then the mushroom blocks are just going to break down and nourish my soil. But, I've been doing it for a few years now, and I've had a ton of success. It's awesome to be harvesting mushrooms in the middle of winter and it's just fun. It gives you something to do, something to look forward to, which is super important in the cold months. The biggest setback, of course, is the cost of the setup and the blocks. But the most annoying thing is that you've got to keep this thing clean. Those mushrooms give off a ton of spores and you can't let it build up too

much or it's going to cause problems like mold and things you don't want. So, taking all those things into account, I'm going to give Mushroom Tent B tier. Now, finally, we have made it to the last method, the biggest experiment on this entire list, which is growing mushrooms on recycled cardboard boxes. And I had never really seen this before, but to me, it just seemed to make perfect sense considering cardboard is basically just processed plant fiber, which is a super carbon heavy material. And in this day and age, everyone has tons of it lying around that they're just going to recycle or throw away.

Now, you want to avoid cardboard with any heavy dyes or glossy coatings or bright printed colors. And you need to remove any of the tape or stickers or plastic. You just want that pure cardboard. Then I rip the cardboard into smaller pieces to make it easier to process. And since we're growing in a bag and we're growing indoors, sanitation becomes very important. So to sanitize this cardboard, I'm going to boil it in water for 20 minutes. Then I'm going to transfer it into this big tub to cool down, which I made sure was very clean beforehand. Now, to inoculate the cardboard, I'm using these mushroom grow bags that you can easily buy online. They're food safe, they're sterile, and they have this built-in

filter patch that allows excess carbon dioxide to escape while still protecting the inside of the bag from contamination. And for my mushroom spawn, I'm just using one of these standard mushroom fruing blocks. I've got some king oyster mushrooms. And each bag only required about a quarter of a block to fully colonize. Which means for the price of one fruing block with recycled cardboard, you could technically get four fruing blocks. Pretty cool. I made sure to squeeze out that cardboard really well before packing it into the bag. I layered that cardboard and mushroom spawn and I packed the bag pretty tightly. Then I sealed everything up with tape, making

sure that filter patch stayed exposed. And I actually let the bag colonize in my greenhouse to just give it a little extra warmth and speed things up. And after about 2 weeks, I could already start seeing those little patches of mycelium starting to take over that cardboard. Then it just kept spreading and spreading. And about 4 weeks later, the entire bag had turned completely white with myelium, which to me felt like a good time to cut open the bag and throw it in my mushroom tent to really create optimal conditions for fruiting. But honestly, at this point, I still had no idea if this experiment was going to work. But after about a week in the tent, I started seeing these tiny

little king oyster pins starting to form. And that's when I started getting really excited, but I still wasn't sure if the cardboard alone had enough nutrition to grow full mushrooms. And then boom, just about 3 days later, I walked down in my tent and I had these incredible king oyster specimens exploding from all sections of this bag. So, that happened about last week. I am just keeping that in the tent to see if it's going to fruit again. You can see it's still spreading through the cardboard. And I am pretty confident I'll get another flush out of this. Maybe two. Who knows? So, for that method, oh man, the biggest setback obviously is just time and dedication to make those bags. It's amazing how much

cardboard you need to just fill one bag, but the results blew my mind. So, weighing both those things, I will give it the B tier. And that wraps it up. Those are all the mushroom methods that I have tried. I'm sure more will come up and I will share those along the journey. If you want more mushroom and growing content, check out these videos. I can't believe I grew these mushrooms on cardboard. That's insane.