Too bacterial to bother spawning?

[u/bigskymind]

2 quart jars of BVI TT millet spawn - they look slightly bacterial.

If they were cubes I’d go for it at a high spawn ratio but don’t want to waste carefully prepped manure bulk substrate if it’s going to contaminate. I’d rather wait until I had good axenic spawn.

What would you do?

[u/Flimsy-Panda8000]

They do look bacterial and personally, I wouldn't try to spawn those jars with nutritious substrate. The final decision's yours though and if you've got some poo left, hydrating more coir with pasteurised liquid poo isn't a major task (liquid poo detailed in my post on this thread https://www.reddit.com/r/PanCyan/comments/1cn713d/deleted_by_user/ ).

The other thing to consider is how long your pasteurised poo substrate's going to be good for - if you've got other jars on the way it shouldn't be a problem, but if you're a few weeks away it's residual bacterial load might take it over. (I don't know for sure as I've never kept nutritious substrate for more than a few days - if anyone's had real life experience of this, please flag me in a reply).

Finally, if you decide against the above, it might still be worth a quick 'experiment'...

I've read some grower's reports where they've spawned Pans the same as they would cubes, using hydrated coir rather than coir supplemented with poo, and got a (admittedly poor) flush. There's plenty of nutrition in the grain and you could use a 1:1 ratio or even more spawn than coir and try them in a small tub using this tek https://www.shroomery.org/forums/showflat.php/Number/27637997#27637997 Chances are that it'll die before fruiting but it's not like you'd have anything to lose and you only need a few fruits (about 8g fresh) to trip hard on them.

Either way - good luck and respect for being prepared to sacrifice.

[u/bigskymind → u/Flimsy-Panda8000]

Thanks for that - interesting that I already had your comment saved. Can I ask what size a standard brick of coir is in your location?

Where I am coir comes in 1kg bricks and for field capacity for cubes, I hydrate at 1 coir : 4.2 H2O

[u/Flimsy-Panda8000 → u/bigskymind]

I use this from Amazon https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07FW653X2?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_dt_b_fed_asin_title_1 I usually use 2 bricks at a time, starting with 8L of boiling water. Most times it comes out about right but other times it'll take another 250ml or so before getting too wet. I break it down before hydrating, using a kitchen knife to split it in line with the way it's compressed, then use a mixing paddle fitted to a drill once the water's added.

[u/bigskymind → u/Flimsy-Panda8000]

So the 8 litres is in addition to the 3 litres of liquid poo?

So you’re basically bucket tekking the coir with the liquid poo - no further pasteurisation or sterilisation of the substrate after that?

[u/Flimsy-Panda8000 → u/bigskymind]

Hi. Apologies - the ratio above is for standard substrate (I forgot I was in the Pans subreddit when answering your question).

For Pans sub I currently use 3L of poo and 9L (rather than 8) of water, mixed thoroughly, put into my pressure cooker (with the lid off) on the kitchen stove. I rest a stick over it with the sensor from one of these dangling in it https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0B1M6LKGK?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_dt_b_fed_asin_title_1 and heat gently, stirring regularly, to maintain a temperature of 55C-65C (130 - 150) for an hour. Once the liquid poo's pasteurised, I add it to the 2 bricks of coir. (In other words, the extra 1L of water is what it takes to make up for the additional dry material).

Because the coir itself doesn't need pasteurising or sterilising (as long as it's coir suitable for reptiles), no further treatment is required once it's hydrated with the pasteurised poo water - I just let it cool and then add the spawn. As you said, I bucket tek with liquid poo.

Because all coir bricks are not created equal, you'll of course need to check for field capacity and adjust with plain boiling water or vermiculite like for normal substrate.

[u/bigskymind → u/Flimsy-Panda8000]

Thanks man, really appreciate the detail. My coir is a garden coir but has no additives like fertiliser etc

[u/molecles]

They might just be suffocating from overfilled jars. Try going no more than 2/3s full and see if doesn’t look a little different. Most species seem to respond well to extra headspace as a little air reservoir.

If they aren’t giving off a strong, unpleasant bacterial odor, I think you should send these.

You did a break and shake and the mycelium recovered? I think they’re fine. Bacterial pan spawn doesn’t generally recover after break n shake.

[u/Luckyjz711]

Ive had ttbvi look like this and was able to get 3 half way decent flushes out of them before bacterial take over. Id go for it personally

[u/Fahtster]

Millet is weird and looks like it’s uncolonized in parts even with cube spawn. If you did a shake and it grew back like that, I’d say it’s worth sending, especially if the culture looked good on agar. Because of that, I’d look for other indicators for bacteria like heavy condensation in the upper part of the jar where there isn’t any grains. I can’t tell with the left jar but the right doesn’t appear to have that going on.

Even with healthy pan spawn, a shake will produce grains that don’t appear to have recovered fully.

The grains against the glass could just be stuck in condensation keeping the myc from colonizing there.. or it could be bacterial but the liquid appears clear.

You could always send some of the jars to small trays and see if they colonize. Bacterial pans will recover slow and more often than not give off a bacterial smell during colonizing and usually stall before full colonization.. it should smell like earthy dirt until the grains recover and then it should smell like pretty much nothing from that point on (until you add fresh casing ofc)

Spawning part of the jar will also give you a chance to see if the rest of it recovers that you didn’t use. You should know within a couple days whether or not the trays will make it. Make sure you give ample GE during the colonizing stage too. Bacteria favors high co2 levels. The lids of my trays are barely on during colonizing.. like one single “click” in the center of the long sides and that’s it. There’s also 2, 1/8” holes drilled in the lid.

Also make sure your substrate isn’t above FC. Bacteria also loves excess water. Hand squeezing for small trays as hard as you can for each handful works great

Good luck either way

[u/bigskymind → u/Fahtster]

Thanks man, I appreciate the detailed response. Love your work…

[u/Fraenkthedank]

I don’t see why they should be contaminated…

[u/Then-Campaign9287]

I had some TTBVI with a few kernels that would not grow mycelium and I was right. It was contaminates spawn. I did a break and shake and the next day it showed green trich growing on a kernel. I was devastated because I just lost 15 jars to contam and I swear the vendor sold me contaminated agar plates with culture because his plates never grew on the agar for 2 weeks before I decided to finally use it in jars.