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Despite their noble origin, mushrooms are ready to put up with changing growing conditions. Therefore, the cultivation of porcini mushrooms in the country is available to any gardener who has experience in cultivating mycelium of other forest gifts. If you do not have such a skill, then before growing porcini mushrooms in a personal plot, you need to thoroughly study the cultivation technology, and even better, first practice on breeding champignons.
White mushroom, or boletus, refers to tubular mushrooms. It vegetates in sandy lands, but can also grow in fertile soil. It is more common under birches, less often under oaks, prefers mature trees older than 20 years. It lives in the temperate and subarctic zones throughout Eurasia. Fruiting from June to October.
Read this material and watch a video on how to grow porcini mushrooms in the country in the open field. After that, you can start cultivation.
What do white mushrooms look like?
The cap of the porcini mushroom can be painted in various colors: yellow, brown, brown, red, purple, gray-brown. Coloring depends on the place of growth of the fungus. Also, the hat can be uneven in color: often at the edges it is much lighter than in the center. The hat is tubular, cushion-shaped, grows up to 20 cm in diameter.
The tubules are white at first, then become yellowish-greenish or yellowish-olive. The leg is thick, thickened below, with a mesh pattern. Sometimes it is present only in the upper part of the leg. Usually its color matches the color of the hat, only a little lighter. The pulp of the fruiting body is white, dense, odorless and with a nutty taste. In the place of the cut, the color does not change.
See what porcini mushrooms look like in these photos:
White mushroom is valued not only for its taste. It is also able to stimulate the secretion of digestive juices. It should be noted that the boletus in terms of nutrient content differs markedly from other mushrooms. Despite all its positive qualities, it is noticeably inferior to the boletus in terms of the presence of proteins, and the chanterelle and morel in terms of the content of trace elements such as phosphorus and potassium. It should also be noted that the digestibility of protein after drying the white fungus increases by 80%. Dried mushroom has its own special flavor, so its powder is often used as a seasoning for various dishes.
White fungus also has other useful qualities: tonic, anti-infective, wound healing, antitumor. Thanks to the lecithin contained in the mushroom, it is useful for anemia and atherosclerosis, liver and kidney diseases, and eye pathologies. It has a positive effect on the immune system, helps break down glycogens and fats, remove excess cholesterol from the body.
These mushrooms, growing under different trees, have different cap colors. The darkest mushrooms vegetate under the spruce, and those growing under the pine have a beautiful red-brown hat.
The following describes in detail how to grow porcini mushrooms in their summer cottage.
How to grow porcini mushrooms: preparing open ground
Borovik has always been considered the king of all mushrooms. Before growing porcini mushrooms in the country, remember that they belong to the group of mycorrhizal, that is, vegetative in symbiosis with tree roots. Therefore, the conditions for growing porcini mushrooms should be similar to the conditions under which they live in the wild.
Mushrooms grow only under birches, aspens, spruces, beeches, oaks. They like moderately moist and light glades, but not under the open rays of the sun. Boletus will not grow in dark places. Also, the porcini fungus does not tolerate the neighborhood with some herbs, such as fern and hoof. When choosing a place for the cultivation of this mushroom, all these factors should be taken into account.
If you have appropriate trees in your garden plot, then you can easily start growing porcini fungus on an industrial scale. In artificial conditions, without trees, no one has yet been able to grow this mushroom.
To grow porcini mushrooms in open ground, you need to take care of the preparation of the beds. To do this, a pit 2 m wide and 30 cm deep is dug on the selected site. It is filled with a special mixture, which is prepared in advance. Fallen oak leaves are harvested in the spring and mixed with rotten oak wood and clean horse dung. Both oak wood and horse manure must be added to the leaves in a ratio of 5% of their volume. First, leaves are laid in a layer of about 20 cm, a little horse manure and rotten wood are poured and watered with a 1% solution of ammonium nitrate. Then lay exactly the same new layer. Thus, several layers are performed. After 7-10 days, the mixture should warm up to 40 ° C. At this point, it must be mixed so that it becomes a homogeneous mass. A month later, the mixture is ready and it is laid in a pit in the form of layers 10–12 cm thick. In accordance with the correct technology for growing porcini mushrooms, each layer of the mixture is poured with garden soil 6–8 cm thick. The entire thickness of the bed is about 50 cm. In the middle it is made higher so that water rolls off it.
The following describes how to grow mycelium of porcini mushrooms in the country.
Sowing mycelium and caring for porcini mushrooms
There are several ways to grow porcini mycelium. In the first method, overripe mushrooms are collected and poured with rainwater in a wooden bowl. This mixture is left for a day. Then mix well and filter through a rare tissue. As a result of this procedure, many porcini spores remain in the water. They sink to the bottom. For their germination, you can add a little baker’s yeast to the water. Then gently remove the foam with a spoon and drain the upper part of the clear liquid, and place the rest of the solution with spores in the light. You can drain the remaining liquids from different containers into one. After a week, the upper part of the clear liquid is carefully drained, and the settled suspension is poured into bottles and stored in the refrigerator. This suspension can be used for a whole year, but it is better to use it within the first month, since it is at this time that the spores remain viable. This mixture is poured over the prepared bed, and the top layer of soil is first removed. You can also pour the mixture around selected trees. Before growing the mycelium of porcini mushrooms, you first need to carefully, without damaging the roots of the trees, remove the soil layer. This is done in order to expose the roots of the trees. Then pour them with a suspension and cover with earth again. Pour the suspension at the rate of 400 g for every 30 cm. After that, the soil should be poured abundantly with 4-5 buckets of water.
This video talks in detail about growing mycelium of porcini mushrooms in the first way:
In the second method, the mycelium is harvested in places where white mushrooms grow. Why are soil layers cut out around the mushroom with dimensions of 20 X 30 cm and a thickness of 10–15 cm. Then they are cut into several parts and planted in a bed or in a chosen place so that there is a layer of earth 5–7 cm thick above them. moisten a little and cover with leaves and shields so that they are always wet.
Ceps should be sown under the same trees under which the planting material was taken. It has been noticed that mushrooms grow better under trees that are 15–25 years old.
You can sow the mycelium in another way. Why overripe caps of porcini mushrooms are cut into small pieces and mixed with a small amount of soil. Then moisturize it a bit. You can also sow slightly dried mushroom caps. They are laid out on a bed and watered. After 5-6 days they are removed – the spores, together with water, have already penetrated the soil. You can put pieces of the cap under the top layer of soil. It is better to sow mycelium in September.
This video shows how to grow porcini mushrooms in the second way:
When leaving, the mycelium should not be poured too much with water, it may die; but in dry autumn it should be moistened with a watering can or sprayer. Growing and caring for the mycelium consists of periodic watering during dry summers. Water preferably early in the morning. It is not necessary to apply mineral fertilizers. Solitary mushrooms appear the next year after planting, and a good harvest is taken 2 years after sowing. Under one tree you can get a bucket of harvest. When picking mushrooms, they should be carefully cut, leaving the remains of the stem so as not to damage the mycelium.