Last spring my neighbor from across the arroyo came over to get some plants. She mentioned that she was growing mushrooms in the shadiest parts of her garden, on north sides of large shrubs and in between big tomato plants in raised beds. I said ‘no way. It’s too dry here to grow mushrooms’. About a month later I went over to her place to help her with some irrigation and sure enough she pulled up a lovely Wine Cap to prove it. She tried this experiment after having a bunch of cottonwoods removed and was left a big pile of wood chips. Wine Caps require shade, water about once a day, and a soft hardwood chip mulch or straw or a combination.
I was struggling to figure out where I had some shade so I could try it out for myself. My greenhouse is not terribly shady, but it has raised beds and is not in use during the summer. I decided to cover the greenhouse with shade cloth. I ran string from the raised beds to the roof and planted Yard Long beans to create more shade, but also to eat if I was lucky enough. I filled in a layer of straw on to my raised beds and then sprinkled a 6 lb bag of sawdust spawn that I bought online after wetting the straw. Then I covered that with a layer of Cottonwood chips which I got from another neighbor who had tree removal. This was all around the beginning of June and by September I had Mushrooms. Not tons, but enough that I had to dry some (they come in flushes and I wasn’t prepared with a recipe).
Having mushrooms in my green house was pretty cool, but what is even better is the soil that I am left with. It is BLACK and filled with worms and still filled with lots of mycelium. I’m pretty sure that once inoculated these beds should continue to produce mushrooms for years, as long as I keep replenishing with some substrate for them to colonize. Last week I added a bunch of shredded aspen to one of the beds since it was empty for about 5 minutes. Later this spring I plant to do an outdoor spot that has shade cloth over for shade loving perennials that are for sale at market. That spot will be Wine Caps again. I have two more beds in the greenhouse that I intend to inoculate with an oyster mushroom which only needs straw as a substrate.
I honestly don’t even care if I get a harvest. The soil that resulted was so exceptional that I could just grow them in order to move this soil around the garden.