The haztek - a guide for newbies and people who want an easy to follow informative guide to growing mushrooms on cakes. From start to trip in 20 steps and about a months time (This is a rough estimate). Click on the table of contents to navigate to a certain section. This tek is written for informative purpose only. The writer of this tek is not responsible for anything that happens to you if you choose to do illegal stuff. Use your head, and be careful. A thanks goes out to everyone who contributed the pictures that are used in this tek. I would also like to thank PF for giving us a place to start. Without firm ground to get a running start from, nothing would ever get accomplished. Clickable links are in blue, normal text is black.

==<[ T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S ]>==

Measurements

Sterilization

Materials

Instructions

Tips and Advice

==<[ M E A S U R E M E N T S ]>==

For each half pint jar of substrate, use the following
1/2 cup vermiculite - for holding moisture
1/4 cup brown rice flour - for nutrients
1/4 cup water - for moisture

==<[ S T E R I L I Z A T I O N ]>==

15 PSI for 45 minutes. This means once the pressure cooker gauge has reached 15 PSI, you must let them pressure cook for 45 minutes. If you don’t cook them long enough, or at a high enough PSI, you may have contamination problems. If you cook them for too long, or at too high of a PSI, you will over sterilize and kill every thing in the substrate which will also give you contamination problems. Also, be sure the jars are completely cooled before inoculating them with the spores. If the substrate is too hot, you will kill the spores on contact. It is also wise to leave out one or two jars without inoculating them. These will serve as control jars. If the control jars contaminate, you know the problem is in your sterilization, if they do not contaminate, the problem is in the spore syringes.

==<[ M A T E R I A L S ]>==
Click the white text to see a picture

Half pint wide mouth Kerr canning jars (Wal-Mart or grocery store)
- Sold in boxes of 12

Pressure cooker (Wal-Mart)
- Large enough to fit 6 to 10 half pint jars in

Brown rice flour (health food store)
- Large bag, always cheaper if you buy bulk

Vermiculite (plant nursery)
- Large bags, any grade verm you can find will work

Mixing bowl (Wal-Mart or grocery store)
- For mixing up your substrate.

See through tub (Wal-Mart)
- Large enough to hold 12 to 24 cakes, tall enough to double stack cakes with a lid

Measuring cups (Wal-Mart or grocery store)
- The only two you will need is 1/4 cup size and 1/2 cup size

Electric tape (hardware store)
- For taping the lids

Small metal spoon and fork (figure this one out for yourself)
- For mixing the substrate and packing the jars

Water (most likely a faucet, or melt snow if you have to)
- For moisture

Antibacterial hand soap (Wal-Mart or grocery store)
- For keeping your hands clean and free from harmful bacteria

Hydrogen peroxide H2O2 (Wal-Mart or grocery store)
- For killing contamination and using in the cold water shock and dunk

Paper towels (Wal-Mart or grocery store)
- For cleaning up stuff and picking up burning hot jars out of the pressure cooker

Tin foil (Wal-Mart or grocery store)
- For covering the jars while pressure cooking and also for chasing the dragon (just kidding)

Denatured isopropyl alcohol (Wal-Mart or grocery store)
- For sterilizing the instruments, try to get the 99% stuff, the weaker stuff usually has oils and other unnecessary things, but if you cant find or afford the 99% stuff, the normal isopropyl will work

Cool mist humidifier (Wal-Mart)
- This is not necessary, but you may need it to keep the humidity levels up in your fruiting chamber

Screen or ten gallon aquarium lid (pet store)
- This is for drying the mushrooms on

Spores (see the mindorgy.net links page and look under Body and Mind or the shroomery.org vendor’s page for a great list of trustworthy spore vendors)
- This is for growing the mushrooms, for microscopy use only of course

==<[ I N S T R U C T I O N S ]>==

1. Go to Wal-Mart and pick yourself up some half pint Kerr jars, a see through tub, some paper towels, tin foil, antibacterial hand soap, hydrogen peroxide, isopropyl alcohol, a decent sized pressure cooker, a roll or two of electric tape, and some measuring cups. The jars do not necessarily have to be Kerr brand, but make sure they are wide mouth. If you do not get the wide mouth jars, you will have a bitch of a time getting your cake out of there. You only need the 1/2 cup and the 1/4 cup for measuring, but they usually come in sets. If you can’t afford these things, then you probably shouldn’t try to grow mushrooms. Also, DO NOT attempt to grow mushrooms in your parent’s house, unless you have their complete permission.

2. Go to your local health food store, and have them order you a large bag of brown rice flour (BRF). It will be cheaper to have them order it for you, and less time consuming than grinding up brown rice in a blender or coffee grinder. If you do not have any health food stores where you live, try a grocery store. They usually have health food sections that will have what you are looking for. If you can’t find brown rice or brown rice flour where you live, then I highly suggest you think about relocating.

3. Go to your local plant land or plant / landscaping nursery, and buy a few bags of vermiculite (verm). It doesn’t really matter which grade you use. Some people prefer the medium grade (larger pieces), and some people prefer the finer grade (smaller pieces). Perhaps get a bag or two of both, and see which one you like better. As I said before, it’s all left to your own personal preference.

4. Find a good place to order your mushroom spores. Check out the vendor page on shroomery.org. I recommend trying the B+, Lipa Yai, Koh Samui, and Amazonian strains. They are all fairly easy to grow on brf / verm cakes, resist contamination well, and have very good potency, yields, and fruit sizes.

5. Get your electric tape and the lids. Make sure the glue on the lids is facing up, towards the lid, not towards the bottom of the jar. If you pressure cook the jars and the lids have the glue facing down, they will be a bitch to open. So you tape the lids in a cross pattern to make sure the lids stay together. This will make your life easier when the lids have to come off in one piece when its time to inoculate.

6. Now you’re ready to make the substrate. Get yourself a fairly good sized mixing bowl and all of your tools ready. The approximate measurements for 1 half pint jar is 1/2 cup vermiculite, 1/4 cup brown rice flour, and 1/4 cup water. I usually put enough substrate mix into the bowl to make 2 jars at a time. Doing basic 4th grade math I know you are all capable of, 2 half pint jars would require approximately 1 cup vermiculite, 1/2 cup brown rice flour, and 1/2 cup of water. Put this into your mixing bowl and mix with the fork until your substrate has a nice consistency. All of the brown rice flour and water should be mixed together with the verm, so what you have when you’re done is a nice looking substrate. If it’s too clumpy add a bit more water, if it’s too runny, add a bit more vermiculite.

7. Pack each jar using the spoon, but be careful not to pack the substrate too tightly, as the mycelium will have trouble colonizing. Fill up the jar to the bottom of the lid screw area. Wipe everything from the lid screw area to the top of the jar with a paper towel, making sure there is no substrate above that level. Take some dry vermiculite and cover the substrate with a layer to the top of the jar. This acts as a filter so any bacteria that happens to get in will hopefully die before it reaches anything it can colonize on. Take the lid and set it on the jar, but DO NOT screw the lid down all the way. Leave the lid on the jar somewhat loose, that way water will not build up in the bottom of the jar and hurt the mycelium once you have knocked the jars up and they have started to colonize.

8. Once you have the jars packed, take the tin foil and rip off a good size square. Fold the pieces in half, then in half again, so you have a smaller square. The squares should cover the jar lids completely, that way water will not drip into the jars and over moisturize the substrate.

9. Take the jars once you have properly prepared them, put them in the pressure cooker and sterilize at 15 PSI for 45 minutes.

10. After the sterilization is complete, take the jars out and let them cool in a clean environment. I suggest for your fingers sake you use a paper towel or a clean kitchen towel to get the jars out. They will be VERY HOT. The jars must be completely cooled before inoculation, other wise the spores will be killed on contact.

11. Once the jars have cooled completely, its time to inoculate. Take your spore syringes and shake them around to mix up the spores in the solution. Take the tip off the syringe, flame with a lighter until it glows slightly red, and wipe with the isopropyl alcohol. Be careful you don’t melt the plastic part of the syringe. This will ensure the needle tip is sterile. Doing one jar at a time, and with disturbing the air around where you’re working at as little as possible, lift up the lid a bit and inject a small amount of spore solution on each side of the jar. Insert the needle down the side of the jar about 3/4 of the way down, and as you pull the needle up, push down on the plunger, releasing a little bit of spore solution. Do this on 4 sides, allowing the spores to colonize faster.

12. Take you’re newly knocked up (inoculated) jars and place them back into the jar box they came in assuming the box they came in is a real box, and not some plastic wrapped sorry excuse for a box. We are also assuming your jar boxes are fairly clean. Place the box into your closet or some other clean place, taking care to keep them out of the light. Now you wait. Give them about 5 to 7 days, then check on the jars. If you see any discoloration to the substrate, such as green, blue, or grey, that is a good sign of contamination. If you've done everything right, and kept it fairly clean, you should start to see spots of white on each of the 4 inoculation areas. This is the mycelium starting to form and colonize the substrate. This is also the point at which your project goes from legal spores to illegal mycelium. The second the mycelium shows up, there are trace amounts of psilocybin. That’s the illegal shit, so be careful. No one wants to go to jail for growing a naturally occurring fungus. As long as it’s not too hot or too cold, they will colonize just fine. My rule for temperature is as follows: If your house temperature is comfortable for you, then it should also be comfortable for the mushrooms. Let them colonize until all you see in the jar is beautiful white mycelium.

13. Once the jars are fully colonized, take them out of the box and put them in a place they will receive some light. The light will let the mycelium know its time to start pinning. The pins are little tiny baby mushrooms. Once your jars start pinning, its time to put them into the fruiting chamber (the see through tub you got at Wal-Mart).

14. To prepare the fruiting chamber, you will need vermiculite, peroxide, and water. Take vermiculite and place it in the bottom of the tub. It should be about half an inch to an inch thick all the way around the bottom of the tub. Pour water with a little bit of hydrogen peroxide mixed into it directly into the vermiculite. This will keep the cakes nice and moist. Stir the vermiculite and the water around until the verm soaks up all the water. It shouldn’t be too runny, or too dry. Try and make it just right. Once you do it a couple of times, you will surely get the hang of it. And if you dont, then maybe its time to take up a new hobby.

15. Get yourself a paper plate. Take the fully colonized jar, and plop it down onto the paper plate. As the mycelium colonizes the substrate, it will shrink a bit, allowing the cake to slide out of the jar (assuming you were a good kid and got wide mouth jars). Be sure your hands are clean and the area around you is clean as well. Wipe the counter down with isopropyl alcohol if you have any second thoughts about your cleanliness. With gentle hands, take the cake, roll it around in the moist verm, then set it down in the tub. Feel free to stack your cakes two high if you need the room. Once you have the tub filled with cakes, they should create their own humidity. You want your tub walls to sweat, but not to the point where the water is constantly running down the walls. If the cakes do not create enough humidity on their own to make condensation appear on the walls, this is where the cool mist humidifier comes into play.

16. Once the cakes have been placed into the fruiting chamber, and the humidity is enough to where water forms on the walls, there’s only a couple more things you need to do. Make sure the mushrooms get some light. If at all possible, place the tub on a chair by a window, and let the sunlight do the work. If you’re in a place where you cannot let sunlight hit the tub without letting other people know what you’re up to, then at least let them have some house light. If you’re awake, have a light on for them, if you’re sleeping, turn the light off. You also want to fan the tub a few times a week. This will circulate the old air with the new air. All you really have to do is take the lid off of the tub, and fan it in a back and forth motion. Don’t do this too much, as you will decrease the humidity level. But don’t go more than a week or so without fanning, as the stale air will promote contamination.

17. Pick your mushrooms, taking care not to damage the cake or the mushroom too much. Make sure you get as much verm off the shroom as possible, then let them dry. Once the mushroom is dry, the rest of the verm should flake off quite easily. Vermiculite is nothing more than a natural occurring mineral, but I don’t think it would be very good for you to eat.

18. To dry the shrooms properly without them molding, they need complete air circulation. Take the aquarium lid screen you purchased at the pet shop, and prop it up with something. Use something like 100 count empty cd reels. Place the shrooms on top of the lid and let them sit there until they are dry. You will get the best results and the quickest drying time if you set the propped up screen on top of your refrigerator. Probably because warm air rises, and the higher up they are, the more warm air flow they will get (that’s my guess at least). They should be cracker dry, which means when you touch them, they should be crunchy like a cracker. Thus the term “cracker dry.”

19. Once the cakes have flushed 2 or 3 times, they will feel dry and light. This is time to cold shock and dunk. Take a Tupperware or a tub you can fit about 5 cakes in. Fill the tub with distilled water. Add a little bit of hydrogen peroxide to handle any contamination that may be on the cakes. Place the cakes inside the tub, and when you put the lid on, the cakes should be completely submerged in the water. Place the tub inside your refrigerator for around 24 hours. During this time, you should take the old verm out of the tub and replace it with fresh moist verm (just don’t put in the verm until the cakes are ready to go back in). It’s also a good idea to clean out the tub with some isopropyl alcohol. Roll the cakes in verm so they are lightly coated, and place back into the tub. The new verm will allow the mycelium to colonize a bit more, making it stronger. The theory is since a mushroom is mostly water, the cakes burn up all the moisture way before they use up the nutrients. If you replenish the water supply, they should continue to fruit until the nutrients are used up. You could probably get cakes to flush about 17 times before you will have to throw them away. This is mostly due to the cakes finally tiring out, fungus gnats invading the cakes, and contamination. You will have great success as long as you keep the contamination and gnats away from the cakes. Once you have flies or contamination once, it will almost always come back.

20. Your finally ready for some good wholesome microscopy use. Turn on some music, turn off the lights, and let your mind take you for the trip of a lifetime. If you've never studied shrooms before, I would recommend about a half 8th (1.75 grams) If you want a good solid trip, 3.5 to 7 grams will do the trick. Good luck.

==<[ T I P S A N D A D V I C E ]>==

Don’t stare at the shrooms all the time. For some reason, they are very shy, and if you stare at them all the time they will grow a lot slower if they even decide to grow at all.

Don’t tell anyone what you’re doing, even if they are your best friend. Once the word gets out that you are "the man" everyone in town will know, and once everyone knows, it’s only a matter of time till you get busted by “the other man.”

If you inoculate the jars before you sterilize, you will kill the spores. Inoculation is to be done after the jars have completely cooled off. Inoculate means to inject the substrate with spores.

Don’t brag. No one likes a bragger.

Don’t worry about being exact. Remember, it’s a fungus, it will grow. If you’re comfortable in your house temperature wise, then they will grow. Unless of course you are trying to grow some weird crazy strain, but chances are if you need to read this, then you’re going to be growing b+ or something similar.

If you’re growing for profit, you might as well not even bother growing at all. For some strange reason, the mushrooms do not like being grown for profit, and you will have lots of contamination issues. That and the fact that your lovely government hates people who make untaxable income. If your growing a lot of shrooms and making a lot of money, this makes uncle scam angry, and he will send his little bitch ass D.E.A. minions after you, seizing everything you own and making your life very uncomfortable. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

For best results in potency to size ratio, pick the mushrooms right as the veil is breaking. Once the veil breaks, the mushroom stops producing psilocybin, and begins to produce spores. This is called sporulating. As the mushroom gets larger, the psilocybin content remains the same.

When asking a question or discussing the mushrooms, never say a friend of a friend, or foaf, or any other stupid acronym like that. All that says to the person you’re talking to is that your growing illegal mushrooms, and you’re ashamed of doing so.

DO NOT put the mushrooms into a baggy until they are completely dry. I’m talking cracker dry, or family sitcom comedy dry. If you put them into a baggy and they are not totally dry, they will mold. Mold is bad, mmmkay.

For best trip results, grind up the dried shrooms in a coffee grinder until you have a powder. Take the powder, put it in a liquid of some sort, and drink that shit down. When you eat shrooms normally, they take about 30 to 60 minutes to kick in. Most of this time is the body breaking down the chewed up mushrooms into something usable, and the psilocybin absorbing into the system. If the shrooms are already ground up, they absorb much quicker, hitting you much harder and giving you a very desirable and intense trip.

Do not eat mushrooms if you’re having a bad day, or you’re not in a solid frame of mind. The mushroom trip will amplify any feelings you have at the time you eat them, and if you have any bad feelings in your mind, even if they are tucked away in a deep dark place in the back of your mind, they will come out and you will most likely have a bad trip.

If you have a bad trip, try and remember the fact that anything that you see, and anything that happens, is all in your head. It is all a figment of your imagination. Think of it this way. Your mind is a very powerful car, and psilocybin is a very powerful fuel. Your mind creates reality, and psilocybin strengthens this ability.

When tripping, be sure to do it in small groups of very trusted friends, in a place that you are comfortable in. Do not ingest shrooms if you have something to do, or have children to watch. Try and make sure you are in a place that no one will show up unexpected, turn off your phone and any thing else that may interrupt your mind from doing its thing.

Have a good time, and be safe. Remember, no one will think you’re any cooler if you eat more shrooms than you should. They especially won’t think you’re cool if you end up freaking out and pissing all over yourself or someone else’s stuff. So use common sense, and always remember its all in your head.

If this tek has helped you in any way shape or form, or you find errors or discrepancies in what I have taught here, feel free to send me a comment form from my website, located here, or leave me a nice rating on the shroomery.

Remember kids, if you live in the united disgrace of America, or certain other parts of the world, growing psilocybin strain mushrooms is illegal, and if you get caught, you could end up in jail. If you end up in jail, your gonna have a bad time. Be careful, use your head, and enjoy this wonderful gift we have been given.

-<[| H A Z |]>-

thejamhole.com

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