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There are many reasons you may want to build a new space to grow mushrooms. If you are an enthusiast, a dedicated space can help you grow better, bigger mushrooms. If you’re a business owner or looking to become one, then learning how to build a mushroom growing house will take you to the next level.
Many people start off by growing mushrooms in a place such as their basement or an outdoor area. This is great, but your ability to control for factors such as humidity is limited. A mushroom growing house or area can help you to control for factors and grow mushrooms more effectively.
There are a few important things to keep in mind, so be sure to follow the steps in this guide carefully and don’t skip any steps. Mushrooms are delicate, so their growing space needs to be very carefully crafted.
What are the ideal mushroom growing conditions?
When it comes to building or creating a mushroom growing house, the whole idea is that you can better control factors like temperature, humidity, and sterilization. These are the major considerations when it comes to your build.
You will need to build your grow house or shed according to the requirements for controlling these important factors. See below.
Running electricity to your mushroom growing build
As a foreword, many of the aspects of the mushroom growing house may require electricity. This can be the lighting, a humidifier, and more. If your build is outside or nearby your main house, you will need to run a cord that connects it to your main house power.
You will want to snake the cord into the build and into an extension cord, or use an electrician to professionally install power to the house to allow for electrical connection.
Important tip: It’s possible to do without electricity if the mushroom growing house is an indoor/outdoor grow that allows fresh air, humidity, and light from outside. If you do plan to ignore using electricity, then the following steps about sterilization, humidity, and light can be ignored.
Without electricity/utilities, then you will technically be building more of a shed or a outdoor storage area, so the guidelines below don’t apply.
When learning how to build a mushroom growing house, you can always start off without electric appliances and then add them in as you learn and improve.
Sterile conditions in a mushroom growing house
How can a dedicated growing space help you grow mushrooms in a sterile environment? It all depends on how you build the space.
Controlling for sterile conditions in a grow space means blocking out potential contamination. This will take on the form of sealing your room from outside air, and only allowing fresh air to enter. You will need to build a space that is wrapped in heavy duty plastic lining, such as this build here:
A build that is largely closed off by hard materials such treated wood, cement, and then plastic for the gaps is important.
In order to be extra careful, you will want to install an exhaust fan that forces fresh air exchange, but you will want fresh air coming into also be clean air. You can install fresh air filters in the other parts of the build to only allow clean air to enter.
Your other option is to introduce an air intake fan that also filters the air, removing contaminants.
Another great option is to install an air filter inside the building that is constantly running, cleaning the air of any outside contaminants that may be circulating.
The idea is to only allow clean air to enter the house, other than the times that you are entering the house.
We recommend exploring online for more ways to keep the air in a house as clean as possible.
How to control humidity in mushroom growing area
The second important factor is to control humidity levels. Humidity can be important depending on the mushrooms you want to grow. We recommend extensively researching your mushrooms to understand if humidity is important or not.
Depending on where you live, the natural humidity of you build may serve just fine for your mushroom growing. Additionally, you can compensate for low humidity levels by doing extra misting/watering for your mushrooms.
If you are going for a fully-optimized setup, controlling for humidity is a good idea.
Controlling for humidity levels in a mushroom growing house requires using a humidifier/dehumidifer setup. You can purchases these appliances on websites like Amazon (affiliate link), or at your local home depot or Walmart.
You can simply place the humidifier/dehumidifier in the build, connect it with electricity, and run it to maintain an even level of humidity for your grow.
Remember, humidity levels matter more for certain mushrooms than other. As we said above, the most important thing is water content in your mushroom spawn/substrate. Keep up a good misting schedule and you should do well.
Lighting in a mushroom growing setup
For our last preparation, you may need to consider lighting for your grow space if you won’t be getting any natural light. Some mushrooms don’t react to or require light in their grow process, so it’s not always a requirement.
You will need to setup LEDs that attach to the ceiling of the build or hang from the ceiling. You can find popular lighting for mushroom growing builds on Amazon (affiliate link).
A basic set of LEDs works well for triggering fruiting and other aspects of the mushroom growing cycle.
Building your mushroom growing house
In this section we will discuss a few basic models for building your mushroom grow house. This can be an expensive or inexpensive build depending on your goals.
The wooden structure/plastic lined grow house
One budget way to create a great mushroom grow house is to build a basic structure using treated wood planks. See this image as an example:
This build style allows you to make it as big, small, or tall as you want. Simply construct the wood in a way that suits your preferences, and then you will take industrial plastic lining like a tarp to cover the inside floors and walls. This helps create the ideal sterile conditions you will need.
Covering the build in plastic also helps protect the structure from the possible high humidity of the inside of the grow area, or any water leakage.
Your ideal build will change and evolve as you learn how to build a mushroom growing house that works for you. We recommend starting small with Martha tents (see below) and working up to a larger grow house.
Using a shed or storage area
Another popular model for a mushroom growing house is repurposing a shed you already own or can buy. Small buildings such as outdoor sheds are widely available as pre-built and ready-to-deliver products from places like Home Depot and Walmart.
You can buy one of these for a $1500-$5000 (depending on the size and quality) and repurpose it to be used for growing mushrooms.
See an image here for a pre-fabricated shed from Home Depot:
Once you simply buy or use an existing shed you have, and then outfit the shed with elecricity (if you need it) to then use humidifiers, lighting, and more.
For this build, you will also want to line the inside with industrial plastic much like the above build. This is for the same reasons of protecting the shed from the elements of your grow.
We recommend checking GroCycle for more information on how to build a mushroom growing house: https://grocycle.com/
Using a room in your home to grow mushrooms
Our last recommendation is to repurpose a basement or extra room in your home with the proper setup to grow mushrooms.
You will follow the same basic steps, such as covering the inside ceiling, walls, and floor with thick plastic to protect the room from water leaks. You’ll then route electricity, if required, to then add lights or humidifier elements to the room.
In fact, sometimes using a room inside your home can be an easier method, because electricity will be more easily available.
This can be a great option for individuals who can’t spend a lot of money on a pre-manufactured shed or build an entire grow house outdoors.
Mushroom Grow House Blueprint
This blueprint illustrates a way you can easily build a functional mushroom growing house.
Equipment for the inside of your mushroom growing area
Now that you have your defined space, you can start to think about how to use the area for storage and processing of your mushrooms.
We recommend at least outfitting your grow space with shelves to hold all of your mushroom growing containers or spawn bags. You will want shelves to create extra space for all of your mushrooms growing at any point.
See this photo for the inside of a mushroom growing house:
You can also use mushroom growing containers like buckets or even baskets. There are many options to use inside your grow area. Mushroom spawn bags are the most popular, but other options can be highly effective. See our post on different grow containers here.
You can also fill your mushroom growing house with Martha tents. These are special tents that create micro-conditions for growing mushrooms.
Martha tents are a small plastic lined shelf unit that is constructed in a way that keeps relative humidity and temperature levels. It’s like a mini green house you can keep in your house and grow mushrooms in!
See our article here on how to use Martha tents.
Using Martha tents is a great idea if your grow area doesn’t have the best conditions to start with. Martha tents can help protect your mushrooms from outside conditions that may not be preferable.
For best practices, we recommend having an additional working area where you prepare and assemble your grow. Your mushroom grow room should be dedicated for the steps of colonization and fruiting.
Making your spawn bags or filling your containers with substrate are activities you should separate from the grow room. This will help keep contamination and clutter out of the grow room.
