The Essential Guide to Cultivating Mushrooms – Stephen Russell – Storey Publishing (US) 2014 ISBN 978 1 61212 146 8 – Lots of good stuff here. The book is broken up into 3 sections – The first is basics for beginners covering (obviously) introductory information on fungi. Types of mushrooms, basic options for growing using kits. Premade spawn, toilet rolls and plugs in logs. It also covers making a glove box and the first grow using jars. The second part covers intermediate methods including pressure cookers and flow hoods, grain spawn and liquid cultures, casing, working with sawdust and fruiting chambers. The third section covers advanced methods including agar culture, and larger scale work with large scale grain spawn and bulk substrates. Lots of colour photos.
Milkwood – Kirsten Bradley & Nick Ritar – Murdoch Books (AUS) 2018 ISBN 978 1 7336 411 6 – This is not just a book about mushrooms, but a book about ‘real skills for down-to-earth living’ and pages 66 to 121 cover mushroom cultivation. This book is great because it is written for Aus conditions and this stuff can be a bit hard to come by. There is an introductory bit about mushrooms in general, , easiest mushrooms for the beginner to try, then information in enough detail to carry the process out about sourcing and pasteurising the substrate, inoculating the substrate, stimulating fruiting and harvesting. They also cover using plastic bags and buckets and outdoor cultivation in logs and the ground. This book was my entry point into mushroom growing. Lots of colour photos.
Organic Mushroom Farming and Myco-remediation – Tradd Cotter – Chelsea Green Publishing (US) 2014 ISBN 978 1 60358 455 5 – This one is an encyclopaedia of fungal knowledge, and difficult to summarise in one short paragraph. It is written in four parts: the first covers the fundamentals of mushroom culture in considerable detail, the second part covers innovative application and projects using fungi including urban mushrooms and off grid mushrooming, the third covers more advanced techniques including starting your own mushroom laboratory, and part four provides detailed information on twenty four mushroom genera. Some colour drawings and photos. If you are serious about mushroom cultivation, you need this book!
Teaming with Fungi – Jeff Lowenfels – Timber Press (US) 2017 ISBN 978 1 60469 729 2 – This is not so much a ‘how to grow mushrooms’ as a ‘how mycorrhizal fungi can improve growing just about any other plant’! The book starts out with an introduction to fungi, generally then to mycorrhizal fungi in particular. The book then provides information in using mycorrhizal fungi in agriculture, horticulture, silviculture, hydroponics and then finished off with mycorrhizae for lawns and turf. Then there is a section on growing your own mycorrhizal fungi! This is followed by some thoughts about the future of mycorrhizal fungi. Some colour diagrams and colour photos.
Crops in Tight Spots – Alex Mitchell – Kyle Books (UK) 2019 ISBN 978 0 85783 529 5 – I have lots of books in my library about growing food on a small scale and in small spaces, but this is the only one that mentions mushrooms! To be fair, it is a one page project (page 30) but gives a reasonable introduction on how to grow oyster mushrooms on egg cartons or other cardboard using commercial spawn. It is a bit of fun and this is a good book generally about growing food in small spaces.
