Starting a small, medium, or large scale mushroom grow can be a profitable venture. Mushroom prices of all kinds remain high as not many people dabble in the delicate practice of growing mushrooms. There are variables to control for, but as you get better overtime you will see your harvests and quality soar. Most importantly, make sure you choose the right commercial mushroom growing equipment.
What exactly is required for a commercial mushroom grow? In this article, we break down everything you may need to get your grow started.
Commercial mushroom growing equipment basics
In this section, we will highlight the best supplies for growing mushrooms at a larger scale. We chose these items for their convenience and effectiveness in large scale mushroom growing applications. What works for a small, casual mushroom growing setup may not work for a larger scale grow.
Mushroom substrates
Of course, your mushroom substrate of choice highly depends on the type of mushroom you are growing. For example, if you’re growing king oyster mushrooms, then you’ll want to choose an enriched hardwood sawdust formula. For other mushrooms, a blend of wheat straw or rye grains is better.
Whichever substrate your mushroom requires, you’ll want to be able to get this mushroom substrate in bulk. For example, a sawdust substrate can be easy to find because sawdust is plentiful as a commodity in the world and it’s cheap from bulk vendors.
If you choose to use enriched soil, this will cost a lot more for the volume you need to grow many mushrooms at a time.
Considering these factors, try to choose a substrate that will both be effective for your mushrooms and affordable at a large scale for multiple, big grows.
Mushroom growing bags
Using mushroom growing bags as your main commercial mushroom growing equipment is the easiest way to grow and store many sets of mushrooms at once, citing the image above.
Mushroom growing bags can withstand the high temperatures of sterilization, so you can fill your mushroom growing bags with your substrate and then sterilize them that way. Double check that the bags you purchase can handle this, so you don’t end up with a melted mess.
Mushroom growing bags also make it easy to keep the conditions sterile from outside contamination of mold. Growing bags often come with easy gas exchange micron filters on them that allow for inoculation of spores without letting mold spores enter.
Growing bags also make it easy to transition to fruiting because you simply cut around them to enable the fruiting stage of the grow. This is an easy and quick transition that other containers don’t have.
We wrote a whole article on how to use mushroom growing bags here.
One downside to using plastic mushroom growing bags is that they are single-use plastics, which are bad for the environment. An alternative to this is using reusable mushroom growing buckets!
Commercial mushroom growing in buckets
See the image below for a commercial grow that uses buckets:
Using buckets to grow mushrooms large-scale is a great option. Bucket stack up and easily store in a warehouse or shed. They also come with handles, which make them easy to transport also.
The only work that must be done to prepare the buckets is to clean them out thoroughly and then cut 0.5-0.75 inch holes evenly throughout the side of the bucket, as this is where the mushrooms will fruit out of.
One important note about using buckets for mushroom growing is that you can’t sterilize your substrate once it is inside the bucket. You will need to sterilize your substrate or buy it pre-sterilized before loading it into the buckets. For this reason, sterilization can be difficult with buckets.
We recommend using buckets once you have a few commercial grow cycles under your belt. In the beginning, while you’re learning, try to start with mushroom growing bags for their benefits.
Commercial mushroom growing equipment: shelter and storage
As you can see in the image above, commercial growing equipment and setups are often stored in sheds or small warehouses, depending on your goals.
If you’re at home, use a backyard shed to contain all of your mushroom growing bags or buckets. We recommend outfitting your shed or room with a number of shelves to place your buckets and bags on. It’s also to hang bags from the ceiling, seen a few sections above. You will need space for your commercial mushroom growing equipment, so optimize properly with a shed or large extra room in your home.
One option is to use an existing room in your house or apartment, but this may be limiting. It may be harder to use natural light as your source of light in one of the rooms of your house, but it is possible.
Pure outdoor commercial mushroom growing is a difficult task to undertake. It’s rare to see a commercial mushroom growing setup outdoors, as the risk of mold and contaminants is very high. Secondly, it’s hard to maintain optimal humidity and water content when exposing your grow to the elements of the environment and rain.
Lighting and elecricity
Regardless of the place you choose, make sure you have enough space to store all of your buckets and bags inside in the space. You may need access to a water source such as a hose nearby, and you may also want easy access to outlets for electricity.
If you choose to use a space without any natural light, you will need to setup lights inside the grow room. This can be an expensive process, so if you’re new to growing we recommend natural light if you can. Otherwise, you will need LED lights to be able to run in the grow setup. You can automate a lighting schedule using a
Keep these in mind when selecting a space. You don’t want to run extension cords too far on your property!
Watering and misting
Many mushrooms require regular misting in order to keep the water content high in the substrate. Depending on the size of your grow and your quality goals, many commercial growing setups will have a misting setup along the ceiling of the grow. This can be efficient with water usage and you can automate the misting process so it’s more hands-off.
If you’re interested in a misting setup, look up the hydroponics setup on Google, as this is out of the scope of this overview article. Misting can be a key part of commercial mushroom growing equipment.
If you choose not to using a misting setup, you will need to use a spray bottle to manually mist your substrates once they are nearing or in the fruiting stage. This also depends on which mushroom you’re growing and the optimal conditions for that mushroom type. For small to medium grows, manual misting won’t be problematic.
Harvesting a commercial mushroom grow
Depending on the type of mushroom you’re growing as well as your goals, you will need to take the harvesting steps seriously.
If you’re growing mushrooms that are typically powdered and taken in that form, then you will need to dry your mushrooms as soon as they are harvested.
Drying mushrooms is best done through using food dehydrators. Food dehydrators are the safest way to dry mushrooms quickly and efficiently. They keep the risk of mold very low, so make sure to invest in food dehydrators when you’re harvesting your dry mushrooms.
This is what a large food dehydrator looks like:
You can find food dehydrators by looking on Google or Amazon.
If you plan to sell fresh, gourmet mushrooms then preservation will be very important. Many mushrooms don’t last very well in the fridge, so you will most likely need to sell your edible gourmet mushrooms immediately after harvest. Be careful with this, as mold can form quickly on wet, fresh mushrooms.
Freezing mushrooms will not work in many cases. Frozen mushrooms tend to get mushy as the freezing process breaks the mushroom cell walls, rendering them mushy.
Conclusion
As you plan for your commercial grow, keep your mind on efficiency of the process as well as costs. It’s easy to spend a lot on a mushroom growing setup, but you run the risk of mold ruining your efforts among other problems. This is why it’s important to follow each setup carefully.
We recommend using 5-gallon buckets as your method of storing your mushroom substrates and growing out of them. This is the method with the least waste and also reusing buckets is easy. You can also store them very easily inside your growing space.
