Backyard Mushrooms
Growing, Wild Harvesting
and Medicine Making
Mushroom Cultivation Weekend Workshop & Campout
Fascinated by Fungi
not sure where to start?
We got you.
June 28-30 & October 18-20, 2024
Everything you need
Always wanted to grow your own mushrooms but not sure where to start? Come camp out on our beautiful forest farm for the weekend and go home ready to start growing delicious and nutritious gourmet and medicinal mushrooms.
You will learn how to grow fantastic fungi at home whether you live in a city apartment or in a backwoods yurt. You will learn sustainable cultivation techniques that require very little equipment, produce an abundance of mushrooms and help the rest of your garden grow more fully.
What People Are Saying
“A beautiful weekend in nature. An eye opening education to the possibilities of mushrooms - spores and cultivation - as medicine and food”
— Backyard Mushrooms Participant June 2021
“Lots of hands on learning experiences. Was great to be around others eager to learn”
— Backyard Mushrooms Participant June 2021
“Chris is extremely educated and knowledgeable and an excellent storyteller. He taught without ever talking down and encouraged us to continue learning and contribute to the knowledge base.”
— Backyard Mushrooms Participant June 2021
“Homely! Like learning from a family member”
— Backyard Mushrooms Participant June 2021
What you get
Start growing mushrooms at home immediately
Feel confident in low-tech methods to grow gourmet and medicinal mushrooms including: Oysters, Lion’s Mane, Reishi, King Trumpets and Shiitakes
Understand the health and medicinal properties of key mushroom species
Take home an inoculated log and a mushroom grow kit that you have created
5 organic, vegetarian, farm-to-table meals (featuring mushrooms of course!)
2 nights of camping on a 30 acre forest farm in the Blue Ridge Mountains
And much more
Chris Parker’s 30 years of mushroom cultivation experience and engaging teaching style will answer all your questions, help you feel confident and inspired to put it all into action when you get home.
We will wander through our forest farm looking for wild mushrooms and eat meals featuring delicious fungi and vegetables from our organic garden and other local farms.
Before you go we will show you how to make mushroom extractions so you can forever supply yourself with high quality, health promoting mushroom medicines.
Topics Covered
Outdoor Cultivation
Log inoculation (totems, small logs, living rafts, stumps)
Garden mycorrhizal (relationship between your garden and edible mushrooms species)
Wild mushroom walk
Identification of wild species
Cooking with mushrooms
Spore prints
Low-tech Cultivation
Cardboard spawn - from wild culture to cultivated
Woodchip cultivation - incorporating mushrooms into your landscape
Pasteurization - low equipment for intensive production
Extractions
Medicinal mushroom medicine making
Double extraction technique
Medicinal benefits of key mushroom species
Chris demonstrates how to make mushroom totems with Chicken-of-the-woods spawn and wild cherry logs
What People Are Saying
“Really fascinating and inspiring! Practiced practical skills. Chris is an amazing educator and source of knowledge.”
— Backyard Mushrooms Participant June 2021
“Chris is an approachable and welcoming expert. I got way more than I anticipated.”
— Backyard Mushrooms Participant June 2021
“Be ready to drink from a firehose! Tons of great information. You will go home with new skills you can put to use immediately.”
— Backyard Mushrooms Participant June 2021
“Chris was incredible in both his knowledge and presentation, only surpassed by his passion.”
— Backyard Mushrooms Participant June 2021
