My straw block has turned white. What are the pink bumps that are forming?
— They are primordia. Each bump will try to become a mature fruiting body. Some will abort. • Do they need light? — No, I have grown them successfully in the dark. Light does encourage primordia formation. When growing mushrooms for market days, I increase light and fresh air a few days before so there will be lots of mushrooms on market day. • Will chlorine in my water kill the mushroom? — No, because like all good cultivators, you will leave the water out overnight in an open container to allow the chlorine to evaporate before you spray it on the mushrooms. • Some of my straw blocks have a peculiar problem. They start to fruit, then when the cap is apout the size of a dime, they get covered with dozens of primordia. The blocks have hundreds of pins, and no mature fruit. The other two blocks are fruiting nicely. They are all sitting on the same table top! — “overpinning” can be a result of too high CO2 (pinning under the plastic can cause this or simply not enough ventilation – of
