DIY Mushroom Cultivation Course

15th - 21st April 2024

FreeField, Chania, Greece

Join us for a week-long DIY mushroom cultivation workshop at FreeField in Crete, led by mushroom enthusiasts, growers and facilitators Nikolaos Gryspolakis, Charitini Paidi and Emily Antoniadi. This course is for those who want to learn about fungal ecology and applications, gain skills in accessible mushroom cultivation techniques, and integrate permaculture design principles and tools.

This course will be held in English but Greek translation will be available.

Themes of the week:

• Intro to Fungi - Ecology, history, human applications and current research
• Lab Setup - equipment, materials, workspaces and skills
• Mushroom mycelium and spawn propagation
• Preparing substrates
• Fruiting with the seasons and creating a fruiting chamber
• Indoor and outdoor methods

Plus extra sessions on request:

• Forest walk for local medicinal and other fungi: focusing on building experience and learning
  
• Intro to ‘Medicinal’ Mushrooms
• Arbuscular Mycorrhiza propagation
• Building fungal-dominant soils
• Culturing local wild mushrooms
  

Meet

the Facilitators!

Nikolaos Gryspolakis, Free Field

Nikolaos was brought up around nature but aged 19 travelled to study electronic engineering in the urban environments of Glasgow and Montreal. During his PhD in photonic systems he discovered the magical worlds of fungi and permaculture, becoming involved in environmental movements and foraging, cultivating and experimenting with mushrooms for food, soil remediation and regeneration. He has facilitated numerous workshops in Canada, Palestine, South Africa and Greece, and since 2016 he has been designing and planting farms around Greece, including the FreeField (Ελευθεροχώραφο).

Charitini Paidi

Charitini was brought up in Athens and studied Crop Science, specialising in Environmental Science and Plant Health. She made her thesis on monitoring the Mycodiversity in protected areas of West Crete. Lately, she has been working as an assistant in research and in the field as an agronomist, exploring collective organic farming, creating new products for food and medicine. Extremely fascinated by the world of Fungi, she will share her knowledge and experience on practicing small-scale diy cultivation at home and outdoors.

Facebook.com/Freeefield

Emily Antoniadi, Mycorama

Emily is a Greek-English facilitator, fungi grower and co-founder of the Doughnut Economics Greece Network, based at Re-Green Eco Culture Center, Greece. Her award winning project, Mycorama, explores on the potential of fungi to support healthy ecosystems, communities and economies, including growing edible and medicinal mushrooms, myceliated grains, regenerative mycelium-based biomaterials, and creating mushroom health tonics. Emily has studied and applied Permaculture Design, mushroom cultivation at Fungi For the People, and the healing potential of medicinal mushrooms with Courtney Tyler and Fred Gillam.

Linktr.ee/mycorama_

About The FreeField (Ελευθεροχώραφο)

The FreeField (Ελευθεροχώραφο) is a permaculture farm located just outside the city of Chania. It hosts hundreds of different plant species from all different latitudes and longitudes of the planet.

Camping spaces and facilities are included in the price, you can pitch your own tent next to the creek under hazel, mango, ancient citrus and platanos trees (even if April in Crete is usually pleasant, sometimes we can have a spring rain or two; therefore waterproof tents are recommended).

You will shower under hanging bananas and you will be using our mobile natural fertiliser dry toilet.

You will be able to refresh yourselves in the creek or in the nearby spring-filled pool.

You will dine on organic local food under the ancient olive trees of our field.

Course Information

Location: Freefield, Chania, Crete

Date: 15-21 April 2024

Group Size: there will be a maximum of 20 participants.

Contribution for the course:

390€-520€

The intention for offering a sliding scale is to make this experience more accessible to a wider range of participants. Please self-select your fair share price, knowing that paying more makes this learning possible for a fellow classmate. If this scale is out of your affordability, please let us know.

The basic price for locals who want to stay at their homes and only eat lunch together is 290€.

The cost of this workshop for the week includes facilitation and learning materials, mushroom cultures to take home, accommodation, shower, and all meals which include locally grown mushrooms and organic food from our garden and nearby farmers.

Deadline to apply: 15th March 2024

Registration and Questions:

To sign up, please fill in the sign up form via the below link and follow the link in the confirmation email to pay a deposit of €75.

Any questions, please email eleu8eroxwrafo@gmail.com or hello.mycorama@gmail.com

Sample Schedule

**Please note: this schedule is not the final programme and intended as a reference. The final programme will be shared a week before the course start date.

Monday

• Arrivals + tours until lunch
  
• Introduction to fungal ecology, history, human applications and research
  

Tuesday

• Cultivation overview
  
• Outdoor techniques overview
• Workshop: Growing outdoors on logs

Wednesday

• Workshop: Growing outdoors in buckets
  
• Fruiting with the seasons and creating a fruiting chamber
• Paddy straw bed preparation

Thursday

• Forest walk for local medicinal and other fungi: focusing on building experience and learning
  
• Workshop: Growing mushrooms in paddy straw and compost beds

Friday

• Lab practicals: mycelium propagation
  
• Preparing substrates

Saturday

• Fungal Soils and Syntropic Farming
• Medicinal Mushrooms and Uses

Sunday:

• Emergent Sessions
  
• Departures