Grow mushrooms and learn hands on at this in-depth 4 day course from a team of experienced cultivators.
Refined since 2012, we have two session locations currently scheduled:
Aug 31 – Sep 3 , 2026 *Closed*
April 21 – 24 , 2027
Visit Floyd, Virginia to learn and camp with us on a beautiful working family mushroom farm in the Blue Ridge Mountains. See page here
and
Oct 21 – 24 , 2026 *4 Spaces Left*
Mar 31 – Apr 3 , 2027
Visit Eugene, Oregon to learn with us in the legendary forests and culture of the Pacific Northwest. City based with trip to the Pacific Coast to forage.
Cost: sliding scale $800 – $1200 usd
Work trade positions are available HERE
This course is excellent for anyone interested in working with mushrooms for food and medicine, sustainable agriculture, ecological landscaping, soil building, or business.
It’s also a great way for experienced Mushroom growers to take their skills to the next level and train new help.
Themes of the Week:
- Laboratory set-up and Skills
- Low Tech and High Tech methods
- Mushroom Mycelium (spawn) Growing
- Growing Mushrooms in the Greenhouse
- Mushroom Gardening
- Identification, Nutrition, and Cooking
- Medicinal Mushrooms and Use
- Mushroom Farm Development
- Growing Mushrooms on Organic Wastes
- MycoRemediation
This is not just an overview. We will be cultivating mushrooms from start to finish; with a wide variety of species at various stages of development. We will perform every step!
Learning Experience:
The daily classes are held in a mix of indoor and outdoor spaces, and are mostly hands-on, with a few powerpoint lectures throughout the week. Mushroom cultivation is a mix of very clean and very messy activities, and we will be teaching in a variety of spaces including a professional laboratory, mushroom farm, homestead gardens and indoor classroom. Every process and activity is presented for you to engage with as much as you wish, with emphasis on helping you develop skills and understanding.
Course size is kept fairly small (18 people) to ensure that everyone can participate in every stage and be able to have any questions addressed. Typically we have guests who travel from all over the US, Canada, Europe, Asia, Africa, and South America, so expect to learn a lot from the diversity of unique people who will also be joining. We will have a French and Spanish interpreter on staff for this course as well.
For over 18 years, Ja Schindler has been a mushroom cultivator and student of fungi in both research and production scales. He has facilitated hands-on mushroom workshops to over 5,000 individuals as an act of social and environmental activism.
Ja creates an engaging learning experience by bringing together progressive cultivation methods, environmental research, rich cultivation history, a vast knowledge of fungal ecology, and creative approaches to connecting with diverse peoples.
This Course Also Includes:
100+ Page Workbook: Details on a variety of cultivation techniques, material choices, glossary of terms, and technical references.
Mushroom Spawn: You will receive 6+ varieties of edible and medicinal mushrooms in pure culture petri dishes to leave with.
Wholesome Meals: Lunch will be provided daily, and is included in the price. Vegetarian, Vegan, and Gluten Free diets can be accommodated. Most of the food is organically grown right here in Oregon, and served with Gourmet Mushrooms and Medicinal Mushroom Teas.
Location: Eugene, Oregon
Exact course address to be provided upon registration.
Offsite Lodging: The course is located within short distance to a variety of accommodations in the city of Eugene. Lodging at your cost and arrangement.
Class Time:
10am to 6:00 pm Wednesday – Saturday
Additional evening presentations and open laboratory hours are optional, but strongly encouraged!
Course price: sliding scale $800 to $1200
Partial Worktrades are now offered, see HERE if interested.
If you experience any difficulties with the above links, please contact us through the form at the bottom of the page.
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For schedule of upcoming courses, follow our page to get first announcements!
Refund Policy and Fine Print: Courses generally fill up 3 months in advance. 20% of the tuition is nonrefundable upon registration. You can receive a refund (minus the non-refundable 20%) up to three months (90 days) prior to the course. If a cancellation is made two months prior to the course, you can be refunded 50% of the paid enrollment. We do not refunds whatsoever for cancellations made a month or less prior to the course. However, you can still transfer your enrollment to a future session.
Details of the Course:
Basic Lab set-up and Skills | Mushroom Mycelium (spawn) Growing
We will walk everyone through the basics; from introducing sterile technique and building starter laboratories, to starting cultures from of cuttings and spores, to small-scale commercial spawn production. This includes preparing and working with petri dishes (Agar), grain, wood products, liquid cultures, and fruiting substrates. A wealth of information is presented, but the pace and language used also accommodates folks unfamiliar with mushroom growing.
The techniques are presented in a simple format, and everyone will be able to practice hands-on. We will also be covering a simple open-air technique which I have developed to save you from spending thousands of dollars on equipment and start growing mushrooms as soon as the course is over!
Mushrooms in the Greenhouse
Indoor mushroom cultivation techniques can vary from passively growing in the shower, to building dedicated grow houses for mushroom production. In this segment of the course we will be covering how to create artificial growing conditions for a variety of mushrooms, both in the soil and through the use of bags and containers. Irrigation strategies, air circulation, temperature control, and natural pest abatement will also be covered.
Mushroom Gardening
A multitude of How-To’s for growing mushrooms right along with all of your vegetables. We will cover companion plantings, mushroom mulches, simple and free mycorrhizae applications, as well as identifying common edible mushrooms already in your garden.
Growing Mushrooms using Appropriate Technologies
There are plenty of ways to grow plenty of mushrooms. We will be covering many of the standard methods of mushroom cultivation as well as employing some more recently adapted techniques for making better ecological and economic decisions. Some of these include working with rocket stoves, generating and working with bio-char, passive solar technologies, as well as anaerobic processing. These are all simple real-world approaches which have found their way into many sensible operations. We will be exploring some new ways to integrate them into mushroom cultivation during this course.
Food Forest Integration | MycoForestry Practices
We will study the fungal social interplay, uncovering the layers of spaces where we can encourage healthy mushroom societies of our choice. Topics such as parasitism prevention, mycorrhizal applications, leaf matter mushrooms, and specific mushroom habitat zones will be covered during this course. We will also discuss how to create appropriate mushroom patches. There are many applications for growing Mushroom Food Forests! This will involve taking the techniques of mushroom cultivation into the bigger picture o
MycoRemediation
We will work the skills developed during the week into the deeper realm of detoxifying soils and waterways with the help of fungi. Introductions to site reading, pollution pre-filtering, bacterial effluent buffering, and soil rebuilding will all be covered through the course.
MycoResiliency
Growing mushrooms for food and medicine at interfaces such as Bioswales, Hugelculture beds, Greywater systems, and natural structures. Getting more return from our work output, as well as working with fungi to solve problems are themes carried with each step of this course, the intent being to make mushroom cultivation an easier transition for your life. We will also open up the concept ecological biodiversity conservation opportunities available through mushroom cultivation.
Some Mushroom Varieties we will work with:
White Elm Oyster – Hypsizygus ulmarius
Phoenix Oyster: Pleurotus pulmonarius
Golden Oyster: Pleurotus citrinopileatus
Reishi – Ganoderma lucidum sensu auct.
Garden Giant – Stropharia rugoso-annulata
Shiitake – Lentinula edodes
Shaggy Mane – Coprinus comatus
Shaggy Parasol – Chlorophyllum rachodes
Chicken of the Woods – Laetiporus conifericola
Enoki – Flammulina velutipes
Lion’s Mane – Herecium erinaceus
Maiitake – Grifola frondosa
Feel free to contact Ja Schindler with any questions by submitting this form:
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