"Mushrooms 101" w/ Benjamin Dion

Benjamin Dion delivered an awesome presentation yesterday, with his “Mushrooms 101” class here at our home base, Sand Hill Farm. We had a great turnout with our participants, who learned a great deal about the lifecycles of fungi, how to identify wild culinary & medicinal species & how to cultivate mycelium in their own home settings. Benjamin even offered our group a live demonstration of the inoculation of saw dust & wheat germ with King Stropharia (Stropharia rugosoannulata), with his DIY still box. Everyone who attended yesterday’s event received an oyster mushroom starter to take home & a head full of new information.

*Photo of our barn loft classroom here Sandhill Farm filled with wonderful people!

Benjamin Dion offering us a live demo of the inoculation process. Here he is using his DIY still box to inoculate sterilized sawdust & wheat germ with King Stropharia (Stropharia rugosoannulata), which will later be used in a sheet mulching technique in the garden. King Stropharia is known for it's remediation properties & can absorb many kinds of contamination in the soil. It is also able to digest nematodes in the soil, which is a huge bonus here in Florida.

Some Ganoderma mushrooms found here on one of our own farm's diseased trees.