Grow Guide for MonoBag™ Mushroom Grow Kit
Important Update
The Enhanced version is now our standard MonoBag™ offering. For kits purchased after March 2025, the Mycowavable™ preparation step is no longer necessary as all kits now include pre-sterilised substrate.
Follow this comprehensive guide to achieve the best results with your MonoBag™ Grow Kit. We also recommend reading our troubleshooting guide for more detailed information which will help you solve and avoid problems.
Kit Contents
XL MonoBag™ Kit Includes:
- XL MonoBag™ with Filter Patches
- 1000mL SteriCoir™ Sterile Coco-Coir Substrate
- XL Grow Tent
- 1 Sterile Grain SpawnTub™ (approx. 650mL of grain)
- Chlorhexidine Alcohol Wipes, Hand Wipes, Facemask
- Sterile Gloves (Optional but highly advised)
Required: 1.5-2ml gourmet mushroom spore or liquid culture syringe (not included)
XXL MonoBag™ Kit Includes:
- XXL MonoBag™ with Filter Patches
- 2000mL SteriCoir™ Sterile Coco-Coir Substrate
- XXL Grow Tent
- 2 Sterile Grain SpawnTubs™ (approx. 1300mL of grain)
- Chlorhexidine Alcohol Wipes, Hand Wipes, Facemask
- Sterile Gloves (Optional but highly advised)
Required: 3-4ml gourmet mushroom spore or liquid culture syringe (not included)
1. Inoculation of Sterile Grain Spawn
Reducing the risk of contamination is crucial in successful mushroom cultivation, and you can achieve this by working in a small, clean, and draft-free space, ideally using a Still-Air Box (SAB).
Before starting, cleanliness is paramount; take a shower, put on fresh clothes, and cleanse your hands and forearms with a blue Clinell wipe. Ensure you have a face mask on, but hold off on your sterile gloves until step 4.
Next, prepare your syringe by attaching a new sterile needle. Now, take out your SpawnTub(s) from their boxes. Be mindful, once removed from the boxes, they are more exposed to the open air and any potential contaminants – that’s why working within a SAB is strongly recommended to minimise this risk.
XL vs XXL Note:
The XL kit comes with 1 SpawnTub while the XXL includes 2 SpawnTubs for added security. With the XXL, if one SpawnTub contaminates, you can still proceed with the other.
You’ll notice a grey rubber injection port on the lid of each SpawnTub. Use a green Clinell alcohol wipe to sanitise this. Now you’re ready to inject the spore or culture solution. Pierce the needle through the cleaned rubber port and inject solution into each port: 1.5-2ml for XL kit SpawnTub or 1.5-2ml into each of the two SpawnTubs for XXL kit. Just remember, the filters on the lid are not for injection!
After injection, give the SpawnTub(s) a nice shake to distribute the solution all around (this will dramatically increase colonisation time).
Inoculation Troubleshooting Tips:
- Keep syringe handling to a minimum and only when necessary
- Rattle the syringe off a surface to unstick and distribute spores
- Don’t touch the rim of the SpawnTub lid or the filters – ever
- Don’t inject too much solution – maximum 2ml per SpawnTub
- Flame sterilise needle between SpawnTubs when reusing syringes
2. Colonisation of Sterile Grain Spawn
After injecting the spore solution into the SpawnTub(s), it’s time to set the stage for the colonisation process. Remember, Mycelium is alive and needs to breathe, so storing your SpawnTub(s) in an airtight container is a no-go. Instead, utilise the cardboard box that they arrived in. It acts as a perfect shelter for your colonising SpawnTub(s) and helps keep them free from dirt and dust.
Temperature plays a vital role in the colonisation process. High heat (above 26°C) or cold conditions (below 20°C) can invite problems like contamination or sluggish to non-existent growth. The sweet spot lies between 20-26°C, room temps at a minimum and consistency is key. Heat mats are not recommended as they can cause undue condensation, potentially leading to a breeding ground for contaminants in your SpawnTub(s).
Maintaining the right temperature can be challenging. If you find yourself in this situation, an incubator might be the solution. It’s a more cost-effective choice compared to running your home’s heating system constantly, and it tends to yield better results.
With conditions optimised at 26°C, you can usually expect your SpawnTub(s) to be fully colonised in about 2-3 weeks. Still, nature likes to keep us on our toes, and this timeline can fluctuate based on a multitude of factors. Patience will be your ally here.
Colonisation Troubleshooting Tips:
- Nothing happening? Look for condensation (could indicate microbe growth) or trace the mycelium line with a marker and check for growth after a few days.
- Stalled growth? Unstable temperatures are often the culprit. Avoid excessive handling of SpawnTubs.
- Yellow liquid? This is likely metabolites (natural waste products from mycelium) and not contamination.
- Bad smell? This usually indicates contamination. Give the filter a smell to check.
- Leave the SpawnTubs alone and forget about them – keep them totally still and clean.
3. Preparing Your Substrate
For Kits Purchased Before March 2025 (Mycowavable™ Coir Substrate)
When the grain inside your SpawnTub(s) is fully covered with healthy, white mycelium, you’re ready for the next step. It’s important not to open your SpawnTub(s) before this point, as uncolonised grains can get contaminated when exposed to open air.
For XL MonoBag™: Open the polypropylene bag containing the coir substrate and pour 500ml of tap water into the coir. Close the seal, leaving a little gap for steam to escape. Place this bag inside a microwavable container and microwave for 10 minutes on high.
For XXL MonoBag™: Open the polypropylene bag containing the coir substrate and pour 900ml of tap water into the coir. Close the seal, leaving a little gap for steam to escape. Place this bag inside a microwavable container and microwave for 13 minutes on high.
Make sure your microwave is clean before you start. After microwaving, remove and let cool to room temperature.
If you don’t have a microwave, no problem! You can use steam sterilisation with a pot of water. Here’s how:
- Get a large pot ready: Fill with lots of water and get it to a heavy boil.
- Boil a kettle: Pour the required amount of boiling kettle water (500ml for XL, 900ml for XXL) into your coir bag. Seal the bag and drop it into the large pot of boiling water. Put a lid on and turn off the heat.
- Leave it to cool: When the pot is cool enough to touch, you are ready to remove the bag of coir which should be sufficiently sanitised for your needs.
Check for proper field capacity – when you squeeze a handful of the substrate, you should get a little water stream released which comes to an abrupt stop. If it’s too wet, squeeze out excess water because mycelium hates being drowned but unwanted microbes love it!
For Kits Purchased After March 2025 (Sterile Coir Substrate)
When the grain inside your SpawnTub(s) is fully covered with healthy, white mycelium, you’re ready for the next step. Your kit includes pre-sterilised substrate (SteriCoir™), so no additional preparation is needed.
The Enhanced version of both XL and XXL MonoBag™ kits includes perfectly hydrated, sterile coir-based substrate which significantly reduces the risk of contamination. This means you can skip directly to the next step (Spawning to Substrate).
This improvement makes the growing process cleaner and easier while maintaining the hands-on aspects that lead to more robust harvests.
Substrate Preparation Tips:
- Always make sure to use a clean microwave if preparing substrate yourself
- Check for proper “field capacity” moisture level – not too wet, not too dry
- Be patient and allow the substrate to cool completely before proceeding
- Enhanced kits with SteriCoir™ eliminate the sterilization step entirely
4. Spawning to Substrate
Before proceeding, clean your hands and forearms, and put on your gloves. Take all of the prepared coir and pour it into your MonoBag™ (a long, narrow bag with multiple air filter patches along its length).
XL MonoBag™ with approximately 500mL of substrate and 650mL of spawn.
XXL MonoBag™ with approximately 900mL of substrate and 1300mL of spawn.
Open your SpawnTub(s) and take the mycelium-covered grain brick(s) out. Place the colonized grain into the MonoBag™ with the prepared coir substrate inside. Twist the end of the bag and squeeze through the bag to break apart the brick of grain until it separates into individual grains, mixing it all up into the substrate as evenly as you can. This will speed up the colonisation process, and the faster that goes, the less likely contamination becomes.
XXL Kit Note:
If using the XXL kit with two SpawnTubs, break up and mix both fully colonised SpawnTubs with the substrate. If one of your SpawnTubs contaminated, you can still proceed with just the healthy one.
As the length of the MonoBag™ is very long, there will be plenty of length to twist the bag where the coir/spawn stops so you can tie a knot right there and keep a nice tight block of substrate and spawn for efficient colonisation.
It should look like a substantial beef wellington (or for the Scots, a haggis!)
An ideal colonisation temperature for many popular species of mushroom mycelium is between 24-26°C, but you can always try to mimic the colonisation temperatures from their natural habitat. Getting the temperature as ideal as possible at this point is crucial for success. You need the colonisation of the substrate to be quick, or there’s a higher risk of unwanted microbes taking hold.
In the right conditions, it should take around 10 days to see full colonisation of the substrate. Only when you’re confident that the substrate is fully colonised with strong, healthy mushroom mycelium are you ready to begin fruiting.
Substrate Colonisation Troubleshooting:
- Inspect your spawn: Before mixing, make sure it’s 100% colonised with no unpleasant odors
- Proper mixing: Break the spawn into individual grains and distribute evenly throughout the substrate
- Bag positioning: Keep the MonoBag™ tightly knotted to maintain a compact substrate block
- Be patient: It won’t do any harm giving the colonised MonoBag a few days or a week longer to be on the safe side
5. The best bit… Fruiting your mushrooms!
Maintaining a slightly cooler (but still warm) temperature of 20-22°C during the fruiting stage is essential for excellent results with many popular species of mushrooms.
Fruiting Options for Your MonoBag™:
Option 1: Keep in MonoBag™
Take your “mushroom wellington” and place it inside your grow tent. Keep it wrapped in the MonoBag™ and slice a big X along the top, side to side where you want your mushrooms to fruit from. Commercial mushroom farms often use this method.
Option 2: Horizontal Placement
Remove the colonised substrate from the MonoBag™ and place it horizontally inside the tent, allowing mushrooms to grow primarily from the top surface.
Option 3: Vertical Placement
Remove the substrate from the MonoBag™ and position it vertically so that mushrooms can grow 360 degrees around the entire block for maximum fruiting area.
Option 4: Custom Approach
Keep the substrate in the MonoBag™ while positioning it vertically and cut multiple X’s all over the bag surface to allow for growth from multiple points.
5.1 Humidity and Air Exchange
Humidity and FAE (fresh air exchange) are extremely important for pinning and healthy mushroom development, as is temperature and light. They all need to work in harmony. Humidity will naturally build up inside the grow tent from water you previously added to the substrate mix, which is still stored in the cake. Unlike some other grow kits, you should not mist this kit (unless it looks dry).
The only time you’ll open your tent is when you’re ready to harvest your mushrooms. Even peeking for a few seconds is enough to lose humidity and cause growth defects such as aborted pins and caps breaking. We suggest cutting a 1cm slit through both sides of the tent near the top and placing an electric fan somewhere in the room on a low setting. This will create a gentle air current inside the room, which will help increase the FAE inside the grow tent.
5.2 Light and Environmental Conditions
Your mushrooms will need light to grow. We recommend indirect sunlight or a 6-7000K LED or fluorescent light a few feet away – if the light is heating the substrate, move it further away. If you notice the inside of your grow tent looking dry, it may be due to the fan being too close, the holes you cut being too big, or grow lights (if using them) being too close and hot. Observe what’s happening and adjust your setup as required. Fantastic results depend on it.
5.3 Pinning and Growth
After around 3-7 days, you’ll hopefully begin to see lots of tiny white dots. These are hyphal knots that will develop into primordia, aka mushroom pins. It will take 4-5 days for them to grow into fully mature mushrooms ready for harvest. During this time, they’ll let you know if something isn’t quite right. Fuzzy mycelium at the base of the mushrooms and/or thin stems are an indication that more FAE is needed. Increasing the fan speed or length of the cuts on the bag might be something to try.
Don’t worry about any mushrooms growing around the sides and bottom of the cake. You’ll still be able to harvest them. If you want to give your mushrooms more room to grow next time, use a fruiting chamber instead of a grow tent.
Fruiting Troubleshooting Tips:
- Water pooling: If you see pools of water touching the substrate, dab them with a paper towel. Standing water can become contaminated quickly
- Temperature issues: Maintain stable temperature between 20-22°C. Unstable temps can lead to excessive condensation
- Fuzzy stems: This indicates insufficient fresh air exchange (FAE). Try increasing airflow slightly
- Dry substrate: Only mist if the substrate looks dry; otherwise, humidity should come from the substrate itself
- Aborted pins: Often caused by environmental changes. Maintain consistent conditions
5.4 Harvesting and Subsequent Flushes
When the veil beneath one of your mushroom caps is about to tear off, this is when you should harvest your first flush. If you don’t get there quickly enough, spores will begin to drop from your mushroom caps and make a mess! It’s best to cut the mushrooms off with a clean scalpel or knife. You can also just pull them off, but be careful not to damage the substrate too much.
After you’ve harvested all the mushrooms from your first flush, you can use a method called “dunking” to get more moisture into your substrate. Simply fill a container with water deep enough to submerge your cake and place it in the water. It will float to the top, so you need to use something to weigh it down. You need it to be fully submerged in water at all times.
Place a lid on the container or cover it to keep everything clean. Leave your cake submerged for anything between 6-24 hours, depending on how much patience you have. But obviously, the longer you leave it, the better your results will be. When you remove the cake from the water, give it a rinse under the tap and allow excess water to drain away before placing back into your grow tent.
You should continue to dunk your substrate after each flush. If you’ve taken good care of it, you should achieve multiple flushes of mushrooms from your grow kit before the nutrients are all used up.
Expected Yields
With proper care and optimal conditions:
- XL MonoBag™: Potential yields of 400-600g+ of fresh mushrooms across multiple flushes
- XXL MonoBag™: Potential yields of 800-1000g+ of fresh mushrooms across multiple flushes
Remember that each flush typically produces less than the previous one, with the first flush usually being the most abundant.
Happy shroomin’ folks!
Last updated on 1 March 2025