The forest mushroom (shiitake) is the only gourment class of mushroom that can be commercially cultivated. It is primarily grown in Japan, principally by over 170,000 small lot growers. The current annual world and U.S. markets exceeds $1.58 billion and $10 million respectively. In rural southeast United States over 2 million private non-industrial forest land owners own over 70% of the commercial forest land, much of it undermanaged and not commercially valuable. By introducing and demonstrating the feasibility of using the shrub hardwoods resulting from timber stand improvement for cultivation of an alternative crop-forest mushrooms, small woodlot owners will benefit from a secondary income, and be motivated to improved the future commercial value of their timber. New horticultural standards and technology must be developed since current commercial techniques and supplies for inoculating of host logs with lentinus edodes mycelium remain crude, resulting in limited crop production and inefficient labor. The standard spawn dowel causes fractures in the bark and sealing parafin wax dries out and chips off, allowing excessive weed fungi infestation and moisture loss. Research will complete development and testing of an innovative spawn dowel design, sealing wax formula and drill bit design that will increase crop yield and reduce labor costs.
Keywords:1. Plant physiology2. Food. nutrition. agriculture
