In contrast to many other edible mushrooms, you don't look for the coveted morel in autumn, but in early spring: From March / April you can start looking in stream and river meadows. The more common morel mushroom, on the other hand, can sometimes even be found in the bark mulch of front gardens.
Cultivating morels is very complicated
Breeding success cannot be guaranteed
Many people have already tried to breed the valuable morel. In fact, there have already been successes and you can buy appropriate breeding material. However, successful morel farming requires not only a precisely fitting environment and a suitable location, but also the weather conditions. Furthermore, your botanical knowledge is required, without which a later harvest will not be possible. A further complication is that the morels very often do not appear where they were brought in: instead of in the mushroom bed, the neighbor might be happy about a lush morel harvest several hundred meters away.
You can grow these edible mushrooms yourself
The table shows some types of mushrooms that can be grown relatively easily and without much effort at home. You can get some mushrooms ready-made together with the required substrate, with others you have to inoculate the freshly cut logs yourself.
| mushroom species | Latin name | Available cultures | substrate | useful information |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cultivated Mushroom | Agaricus bisporus | ready culture (incl. substrate) | straw | different varieties available |
| shiitake | Lentinula edodes | Inoculation dowel, grain spawn, ready-made culture | Oak, beech and hornbeam, alder, birch, cherry, sweet chestnut | healthy medicinal mushroom from Asia |
| Oyster mushroom, oyster mushroom | Pleurotus ostreatus | Inoculation dowel, grain spawn, ready-made culture | Willow, alder, poplar, fruit trees, birch, ash, common beech | native winter mushroom |
| Lime Mushroom | Pleurotus cornucopiae | Inoculation dowel, grain spawn, ready-made culture | Maple, willow, poplar, alder, ash, beech | occurs naturally in alluvial forests and along rivers |
| King Oyster Mushroom | Pleurotus eryngii | Grain spawn, ready culture | straw | based in southern Europe |
| brown cap | Stropharia rugosoannulata | Grain spawn, ready culture | straw | do not confuse it with the chestnut boletus! |
| japanese mutabilis | Pholiota nameko | Inoculation dowel, grain spawn | Fruit trees, willow, poplar, birch, oak, common beech | Relative to the native mutabilis |
| Chinese Morel, Mu-Err | Auricularia auriculajudae | Grain spawn, ready culture | elderwood | indispensable in Asian cuisine |
tips
If you find morels in the bark mulch of your front yard, you shouldn't be too happy: Most of the time, no more mushrooms of this kind appear the following year because all the nutrients have probably been used up.