Dry bubble disease may cause a lot of problems because the spores spread quickly. It’s essential to identify and remove the first affected mushrooms to prevent an outbreak of the disease throughout your entire nursery. So how do you remove the first infected mushrooms?

Dry bubble disease is spread by spores. The spores are sticky and are spread by any carrier to which they may adhere, such as people, flies, dust, water, etc.

The best way of preventing the spread of spores is by covering an infected mushroom and removing it. Wet a tissue with a disinfectant such as alcohol or methylated spirits. The spores will stick to a wet tissue. Carefully and slowly place the wet tissue over the infected mushroom without causing any turbulence, which would make the spores fly away. When you have covered the mushroom with the tissue, cover your hand with a plastic bag and pick up the mushroom along with a good amount of the surrounding casing soil. Turn the bag containing the infected mushroom and the casing soil inside out and seal it. Leave the bag containing the infected mushroom in the growing room and dispose of it after you have steamed the growing room.

There are other methods you could use, for example with a plastic bottle. Cut off the bottle’s base, place the bottle over the infected mushroom and fill it with salt.

Whichever method you use, make sure you don’t spread the spores. A single drop of water on an infected mushroom would spread billions of spores over a distance of more than one metre from the mushroom. A few days later you would then see lots of mushrooms showing the first signs of dry bubble disease around that first mushroom.

Regularly check the area from which you have removed the infected mushroom during the next few days to see whether the disease reappears.

More information on how to control dry bubble disease can be found on pages 114-116 of the Mushroom Signals book.

Mark den Ouden

The next Master class Mushroom composting and growing is 21 – 26 October, there are still seat available, more information about the course, click here.

In 2014, Ecovative Designs was working to combine mycelium with local crop waste to make a compostable biomaterial for packaging, and continue to expand their efforts. One example: A collaboration with Netherlands-based designer Eric Klarenbeek who 3D-prints with living mycelium and potato starch to create safe and sustainable products. The results are lightweight, strong, fire-resistant, water-repellent, and biodegradable.

In this Motherboard video from 2015, we meet Klarenbeek, as well as other innovative designers, scientists, and researchers—Han Wösten, Maurizio Montalti, and Willem Velthoven—who are working to improve this renewable biopolymer material for both mass production and creative endeavors. It’s an ambitious effort to replace the single-use plastics that are plaguing our planet. A summary of the mission from Klarenbeek’s Krown Design:

Mycelium is infinitely available and acts as the living glue to bind this organic waste. Let’s join forces to strive for a less plastic and oil dependent economy!

The material is literally grown, not manufactured. We use a growing organism to transform agricultural waste products like husks from hemp, flax and corn stalk into a beautiful protective product that is safe and natural.

Read the full article on The Kid Should See This.

Video credit: MOTHERBOARD

A company in British Columbia is working on the cutting edge of technological design. Salmon Arm's Technology Brewing Corporation has just been awarded $50,000 from B.C.'s Agritech Innovation Challenge for its development of a vision-guided robot capable of accurately picking, trimming and placing mushrooms in store-ready boxes.

"I'm often (asked) aren't you worried about taking people's jobs? Everything that we've automatized people don't want to do," Technology Brewing founder Mike Boudreau said. Boudreau built his first robot in 1985 and launched Technology Brewing in 1999 transitioning the company into robotics in 2006. As someone on the frontline of the robotic world, Boudreau explains the industry, and it isn't quite what one would expect. The jobs the company's robots have been designed to do are far less glamorous than the robots themselves.

See, identify and pick
As mushrooms come in different shapes and sizes, and at some stages of their growth double in size in just 24 hours, Boudreau's company is developing a robot that can see the mushrooms, identify which ones to pick and which to leave. If it sounds complex and expensive it's because it is.

Read the full article here.

According to mushroom quotation provided by Guizhou Dili Agricultural Products Logistics Park, on August 14, Shiitake mushroom, Pleurotus cornucopiae, White beech mushroom, Brown Shimeji mushroom, Monkey head mushroom, Pleurotus nebrodensis, Enoki mushroom, Cordyceps militaris, Big Clitocybe, Seafood mushroom and Pleurotus geesteranus are 11 varieties that show price rise.

1. Price of Shiitake mushroom has risen from 10.6 to 12.4 CNY per kg, indicating 17% of increase range.

2. Price of Pleurotus cornucopiae has risen from 6 to 8 CNY per kg, indicating 33% of increase range.

3. Price of White beech mushroom has risen from 11.7 to 14.2 CNY per kg, indicating 21% of increase range.

4. Price of Brown Shimeji mushroom has risen from 13.3 to 15.8 CNY per kg, indicating 19% of increase range.

5. Price of Monkey head mushroom has risen from 14 to 16 CNY per kg, indicating 14% of increase range.

6. Price of Pleurotus nebrodensis has risen from 22 to 26 CNY per kg, indicating 18% of increase range.

7. Price of Enoki mushroom has risen from 5 to 5.3 CNY per kg, indicating 6% of increase range.

8. Price of Cordyceps militaris has risen from 13 to 14 CNY per kg, indicating 8% of increase range.

9. Price of Big Clitocybe has risen from 14 to 16 CNY per kg, indicating 14% of increase range.

10. Price of Seafood mushroom has risen from 12 to 14 CNY per kg, indicating 17% of increase range.

11.Price of Pleurotus geesteranus has risen from 9 to 10 CNY per kg, indicating 11% of increase range.

On the contrary, by August 14, Pholiota nameko and Drumstick mushroom are 2 mushroom varieties that show price fall.

1. Price of Pholiota nameko has dropped from 14 to 12 CNY per kg, indicating 14% of decline range.

2. Price of Drumstick mushroom has dropped from 12 to 10 CNY per kg, indicating 17% of decline range.

“Price of Superior Shiitake mushroom, Oyster mushroom, King oyster mushroom, Agrocybe cylindracea and Button mushroom is respectively at 14 CNY, 5 CNY, 6 CNY, 10 CNY and 10 CNY per kg. Price of several industrialized (factory-mode) mushroom varieties starts to climb in early August,” introduces manager of Guizhou Dili Agricultural Products Logistics Park passionately.

These three principles are the base of disease control on a mushroom farm. To my opinion there is no farm that has not a spot of disease somewhere.
But depending on what is done it will develop into a serious problem or it will stay a hidden time bomb.
If a problem is discovered it is of crucial importance that is recognised. To make sure that will happen training of people on the farm and especially pickers is needed. They are your eyes on the farm.
They need to know the most common diseases and especially in a young stage. Many places of dry bubble are not recognised and are only seen if the disease is in an almost incurable stadium. The small wart on a mushroom or grey spot is often missed.
The same goes for insects. Many growers do not know the difference between a phorid and a sciarid. Although the damage pattern is totally different, so Is the threshold where it really starts costing production. Also the cure is completely different.
Example: growers use diflubenzuron against phorids.
It is only active against sciarids.
If the disease is recognised then it should be isolated. It can be covered on the spot but the most important is to simply keep all doors closed. Check filters and door seals. If a room is infected, make sure the infection is contained in that one room and does not spread on the farm.
After the isolation the disease can be treated. If the spot is detected in an early stage one can do with just a sport treatment. If it is more the whole room should be taken on.
But too often the infection spreads and the whole farm must be treated. Generally room treatment for a full cycle with an overlap of two or three rooms to break the lifecycle of the disease.

So, just a test:
Look at the photo and spot the phorid. Or is it a sciarid?