Downloadable version

PF-Tek Starter kit

Growing mushrooms by yourself is a fun and educational experience, learning to understand what a mushroom is and how it grows. This kit contains everything you need to make a jump start into the world of mycology and enables you to grow up to 150 grams of fresh mushrooms in just a few weeks. With this kit you can practice, using a cultivation method that is based on the famous PF-Tek (Psilocybe Fanaticus Technique). The PF-Tek is the tried and true method for beginners. This manual will guide you trough every step of the PF-Tek and learns you to understand the full lifecycle of a mushroom.

Kit contains:

1 PF-Tek substrate jar

1 Spore syringe (optional)

250 ml Vermiculite

1 fruiting tray

1 Filter bag

1 Alcohol swab

2 Paperclips

Note: Growing mushrooms is not very difficult. But you must pay close attention to sterility to avoid contamination by other micro-organisms, so always work as clean as possible. This kit is designed to minimize the risk of contamination, but still you have to work as cleanly as possible! With every step you follow in this manual you have to make sure to wash your hands thoroughly with soap and dry them with a clean towel or paper towel.

Step 1: Inoculation

In order to start the mushroom's lifecycle, you introduce mushroom spores from the spore syringe into the presterilized substrate jar. The introduction of spores to a substrate is called inoculation. The substrate jar in this kit comes with two self-sealing injection ports, these will hermetically seal the jar after injecting the spores.

1. First clean both injection ports with the supplied alcohol swab. Do not touch the port afterward.

2. Shake your syringe vigorously to distribute the spores in the solution.

3. Remove the needle protection cap and slowly insert the needle into the center of the injection port.

4. Inject up to 2 ml of spore solution in one port. Slowly remove the needle from the injection port.

5. Repeat step 4 for the other port.

Note: Burning your needle until it starts glowing red is optional and not necessary with the use of a professional prepared spore syringe. Make sure to never touch the needle of the syringe. Do not enter the injection port with a hot needle this might damage the injection port. If the flow of your syringes gets blocked during injection, slowly pull back the needle a bit and continue the injection.

Cleaning the injection port.

Injecting spores into the substrate.

Step 2: Incubation

You need to store the inoculated jar in a dark and warm place at a temperature of 21-27°C to germinate the spores so they will start building mycelium, this is called incubation. The warmer the better, but do not exceed 27°C. Incubation can be done at a room temperature of 20°C, although the mycelium will grow much slower at this temperature. Place the substrate jar back into the cardboard box at a warm spot, now sit back and let the spores do their work. Growth is noticeable after 5 or 7 days: small white dots of mycelium should appear. It can take up to 2 or 4 weeks before the substrate is fully grown with white mycelium, this depends on the temperature during incubation, just be patient.

Not fully grown substrate.

Fully grown substrate.

Step 3: Dunking

Once your substrate jar is fully grown with healthy white mycelium, the substrate needs to be 'soaked' in water, this is called dunking. Lift the lid of the jar 1/3 of the way, turn on the tap and let the jar gently fill up with water. Make sure the substrate is completely submerged and close the lid. Let the submerged substrate stand for 12 hours. After 12 hours open the lid partway and let the excess water run off.

Note: Before dunking you have to be sure that your substrate is fully grown through with mycelium. There must not be anymore pieces of uncolonized substrate visible, except for a small top layer that may not turn white as it is dry!

Add tap water to the substrate.

After 12H let the excess water run off.

Step 4: Fruiting

To start the development of mushrooms the mycelium must be exposed to fruiting conditions. To create fruiting conditions the vermiculite, fruiting tray and filter bag are prepared as follows:

1. Boil some water, take the bag of vermiculite and fill the bag with a 1/2 mug of this still very hot water.

(be careful not to burn your fingers)

2. Close the bag and let the water cool for 30min.

3. Pour off the excess water from the bag of Vermiculite.

4. Put the wet vermiculite into the fruiting tray, and distribute it evenly over the bottom.

5. Remove the lid from your substrate jar and let the substrate gently slide into your clean hand.

6. Put the substrate top side up into the fruiting tray on top of the vermiculite.

7. Carefully put the tray with substrate in the filter bag. Fold the top of the bag over a couple of turns and

close it with the 2 paperclips.

Fill mug halfway with boiling water

Add hot water to the bag of vermiculite

Close the bag and let it cool down.

Pour off excess water.

Apply the vermiculite to the fruiting tray.

Remove the substrate from the jar.

Place the substrate into the fruiting tray. Step 5: Harvesting The first mushrooms should appear after approximately two weeks, so sit back and let yourself be surprised by the appearance of the first mushrooms. Mushrooms mature after approximately 7 days upon first appearing. Harvest the mushrooms before the veil underneath the cap starts to tear. If you harvest too late, everything in the filter bag will be black/purple with spores. Pick the mushrooms from the substrate by gently twisting the base of the stem while you pull it.   This kit can produce up to three flushes of mushrooms. Dunk your substrate after harvesting for another flush of mushrooms

Into the filter bag and ready to grow!