Mycelium 101

What is mycelium?

Mycelium is the vegetative part of the fungal organism; mushrooms are the fruit, or the reproductive (spore-producing) part. Just as you must grow a tree to produce an apple, you must grow mycelium to produce a mushroom. In nature, mycelium is seldom seen, as it will dehydrate if exposed to sun or wind. So it spends its life within the earth, inside a log, or under some other kind of protective mulch.

Spawn is a vehicle of transfer for the mushroom mycelium as it is dispersed and mixed into a fresh substrate by the cultivator. Depending on the substrate to be inoculated, the vehicle can be grain, sawdust, wood chips, dowels, or rope.

Using spawn to grow mushrooms is a method of propagation closer to growing apples, potatoes, asparagus, garlic, or strawberries than to sowing seeds, in that it involves expanding the tissue of a particular individual, so that you are producing genetic clones of the original specimen.