Resources for Mushroom Growers
Shiitake Cultivation
How to grow shiitake mushrooms on natural logs or on sterilized sawdust substrates. The links below bring you free information, but sometimes technical details are lacking. If these articles don't work for you, we recommend Shiitake Growers Handbook - The Art and Science of Mushroom Cultivation by Paul Przybylowicz and John Donoghue.
- USDA's Office for Small-Scale Agriculture: A Small Scale Agricultural Alternative: Shiitake Mushrooms
- Eagle Bluff Environmental Learning Center has made available 33 issues of Shiitake News and other materials. Shiitake News was published from 1984 to 1996 and contains lots of valuable information and research related to growing, marketing and the economics of natural-log shiitake production. If you are giving thought to growing mushrooms on natural logs, you must read these.
- Michigan State Universty Extension: Shiitake Mushrooms - A New Forest Product? (PDF - 79K)
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The University of Kentucky offers a series on shiitake cultivation:
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Cornell University offers the following publications:
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Cornell University and Viginia Tech have partnered to create a comprehensive series on forest farming shiitake (natural logs). Some of these videos are similar to those listed above, but generally have more information. Watch both to get an idea of how different techniques work. For example, the "Drilling" video above illustrates the use of a standard drill while the "Four Stages" video below shows the use of an angle grinder adapted to a drill - the latter is much faster:
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Maryland Cooperative Extension offers further information on shiitake cultivation:
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Alabama Cooperative Extension also weighs in on shiitake cultivation:
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Missouri Cooperative Extension also has some information on shiitake cultivation:
- Various Studies:
- Alice Chen Ph.D.: Cultivation of Lentinula edodes on Synthetic Logs (PDF - 156K)
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For even more information about shiitake cultivation see:
This page was last updated on: December 08 2019.