Fruiting Mushroom Logs at Bristol Organic Food Festival
One of the most interesting things I saw at the Bristol Organic Food festival was the demonstration of fruiting mushroom logs from the people at Ragmans Lane farm in Gloucester.
A fruiting mushroom log is hard to describe. The idea is that log is injected with shitakke mushrooms. It is then placed in your garden and produces a harvets of mushrooms over the next five years. Alternatively you can shock all the mushrooms out at once by dropping the log on its end from two feet high on to a hard surface and then immersing in ice cold water for 48 hours.
Logs usually fruit from May to September in spurts known as flushes. During winter the log should be kept indoors in a recently warm place.
The logs are prepared by drilling holes in firewood grade oak in to which the mycelium (the ’seeds’ of the mushroom) are pushed. They are then kept for a year before being sold to the public.
The logs are sold by Ragmans Lane farm (www.ragmans.co.uk). You should be able to catch them at the slow food market the first Sunday of every month on Corn Street. The price should be around £7.50.
