The Communal Garden: Growing Mushrooms

This is a community gardening class taught by Marc Amante of Central State University Extension. Classes in The Communal Garden series teach gardeners skills that can be used in community gardens or to support their community through gardening. They are low-cost in an effort to advance gardening skills in our communities. The series is a part of the Conservatory’s Growing to Green program, which supports and develops community gardens across Central Ohio. Most mushrooms you buy in the grocery store are grown indoors in large warehouse facilities. Others forage for mushrooms in the spring and fall, when many wild species of mushrooms mature when the weather is cool and moist. But did you know that you can also raise mushrooms outdoors at home, and have your own little mushroom foraging patch right in your backyard, with no need for complicated management or making a fungus-loving environment inside your home? In this class, we will discuss how to raise mushrooms on logs outdoors as a way to raise food in parts of your yard that are usually too shady to grow vegetables or other crops. We will discuss what mushroom species can be cultivated, what tree species they can grow on, and demonstrate how to prepare and inoculate the logs. By following these steps, you can have your own bountiful mushroom harvest!