Growing Mushrooms Business Resources

Business Resources: Growing Mushrooms

This page discusses the growing and harvesting of shitake mushrooms. It can be a long a laborious process, but can be a good income supplement if done well.

These resources have been compiled from various resources and agencies and are provided here for educational purposes only. Please if you find information that needs to be updated, broken links, or if you have an additional resource you feel is pertinent.

Shiitake mushroom, photo by Keith Weller, USDA

Producing Shiitake: The Fancy Forest Mushroom
Louisiana State University AgCenter Research and Extension. This publication provides information on who buys shiitake mushrooms and what types of food they are used in. It informs readers on the materials that are needed to grow the mushrooms. Information is given on spawn, growing the mushrooms on substrate logs, fruiting, harvesting and processing, along with the cost and profits of growing shiitake mushrooms.

Growing Shiitake Mushrooms: A Guide for Small-scale Outdoor Cultivation on Logs (1995)
North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service, Woodland Owner Notes

Growing Shiitake Mushrooms
Steven Anderson and Dave Marcouiller, Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service

Basic Procedures for Agaricus Mushroom Growing (2003)
Penn State, College of Agricultural Sciences, Agricultural Research and Cooperative Extension

Agroforestry Notes: Farming Exotic Mushrooms in the Forest (1999)
USDA Forest Service, USDA NRCS

Growing Mushrooms Commercially: Risks and Opportunities
Danny L. Barney, University of Idaho College of Agriculture

Growing Shiitake Mushrooms in an Agroforestry Practice (2008)
Dr. Johann Bruhn, University of Missouri Extension

How, When, and Why of Forest Farming. Unit 4: Mushrooms (2006)
Cornell Cooperative Extension Service

Growing Mushrooms in North Carolina
North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, School of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences

Mushroom Cultivating and Marketing: Horticulture Production Guide (2004)
Alice Beetz and Michael Kustudia, National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service

Shiitake Mushrooms Production and Marketing: Natural Resource Income Opportunities Series Special Forest Product Enterprises: An Edible Product Example
Virginia Tech and Maryland Cooperative Extension

Listing of Penn State Publications and Videos on Mushroom Production

Forest Farming: Shiitake Mushrooms
Center for Subtropical Agroforestry

A Potential New Profit from Oak Woodlands (2000)
John M. Harper, Richard B. Standiford, and John W. LeBlanc. University of California

Shiitake Mushrooms Enterprise (2003)
Western Maryland Research and Education Center, Maryland Cooperative Extension

Growing Mushrooms
Kansas State University, Research and Extension

Shiitake and Oyster Mushrooms
University of Kentucky College of Agriculture

Producing Shiitake

"Shiitake mushrooms are produced on healthy, freshly cut hardwood logs. Once inoculated, logs will produce for about four years. Shiitake may also be produced on blocks of hardwood sawdust and grain blend. For large-scale production, this is the way to go. This sawdust substrate, although faster in production, demands more skills and more specialized equipment. It also has a greater risk of failure. Some growers buy already inoculated sawdust logs. A good fruiting facility is necessary. Log-style production is much more popular and best suited to home gardens and smaller producers with 5,000 or fewer logs." Read more from the publication Producing Shitake.


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	Mississippi State University • Mississippi State University Extension Service • MSU-ES Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Forest and Wildlife Research Center • Mississippi Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station