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Live culture Shiitake mushrooms fruiting from bark, deep red-brown caps with pale cracked patterning

Liquid Cultures

Shiitake Liquid Culture

Live shiitake mycelium suspended in sterile nutrient broth, ready to inject into grain or agar so you can expand your own spawn at home.

£15.00

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Living culture. Keep it cold and use sterile technique.

Species
Lentinula edodes, the true shiitake

Format
Sealed syringe of mycelium in liquid broth

Use
Inject into grain or agar, not a fruiting medium on its own

SpeciesLentinula edodes

Fruiting temperatureAround 10 to 21 C on hardwood, by strain

Grain dose1 to 2 ml per quart jar

Grain colonisationAbout 2 to 6 weeks

StorageFridge 2 to 8 C, never frozen

ViabilityAround 3 to 6 months refrigerated

What it is

What shiitake liquid culture actually is

Liquid culture is live mycelium of Lentinula edodes growing in a sterile, nutrient rich liquid. Because the mycelium is already active and suspended in the broth, a small injection spreads quickly through sterilised grain and starts colonising sooner than spores would.

Shiitake is one of the most widely grown gourmet mushrooms in the world. It fruits on hardwood, either supplemented sawdust blocks or hardwood logs. The liquid culture is the first link in that chain. It is not the substrate you fruit on.

How to use it

Using the culture to make grain spawn

Work in a still air box or in front of a laminar flow hood. Have 70 percent isopropyl alcohol, gloves and a lighter to hand, and your jars or bags of sterilised, cooled grain ready with self healing injection ports.

Shake the syringe

Shake hard for thirty seconds to a minute so the mycelium spreads evenly through the liquid. This gives a more even inoculation.

Sterilise the needle

Flame the needle until it glows, then let it cool for a moment. Wipe the injection port with alcohol.

Inject the grain

Inject 1 to 2 ml into a quart sized jar of grain, or 5 to 10 ml into a 2.3 kg grain bag. Flame the needle again between containers.

Incubate

Keep the grain dark, around 21 to 24 C. Full colonisation usually takes about 2 to 6 weeks. Once mycelium has clearly taken hold, shake the jar to break up the grain and spread growth.

Move on to fruiting substrate

Use the colonised grain as spawn for supplemented hardwood sawdust blocks or hardwood logs. Sawdust blocks colonise over roughly 8 to 12 weeks.

Let the block brown, then cold soak

Shiitake is unusual. After it colonises, the block forms a brown leathery skin over a week or two. Wait for most of that browning before you try to fruit. Then soak the block in cold water, around 4 to 10 C, for several hours to trigger pinning. Small brown pins appear within a few days.

If you are not sure the culture is clean or active, inject a little onto an agar plate first and watch for healthy white growth with no off colours or sour smell before committing it to grain.

Storage

Keep it cold, never freeze

Store the syringe in the fridge, around 2 to 8 C, in a sealed bag. Do not freeze it, as freezing kills the living mycelium. Used cold and clean, a liquid culture is generally viable for about 3 to 6 months, though vigour declines with age. Use it sooner rather than later for the best start.

Species	Lentinula edodes (shiitake)
Contents	Live mycelium in sterile nutrient broth
Fridge storage	About 2 to 8 C, do not freeze
Typical viability	Around 3 to 6 months refrigerated
Grain dose	1 to 2 ml per 1 litre jar; 5 to 10 ml per 2.3 kg bag
Grain colonisation	Roughly 2 to 6 weeks at 21 to 24 C
Fruiting	Hardwood sawdust or logs; cold water soak after browning

What it is not

What this is not for

This is not a grow kit. There is no substrate in the syringe, so you cannot fruit mushrooms from it directly. You inject it into grain or agar first, then take the spawn on to hardwood.

It is also not food. The broth is for feeding mycelium in the lab, not for eating or drinking. Treat it as a living lab input and handle it with clean technique.

Sources

Sold for legal gourmet cultivation and microscopy use. Keep refrigerated and use clean technique.