At this stage it is very important to continue taking all of the necessary precautions as clearly outlined in all the previous chapters of this book. Basically what you will be doing is taking the cake out of the jar and transferring it to the terrarium (a.k.a. the fish tank). Set up your terrarium as follows:

Clean the tank like everything else. Take the chicken wire or wire mesh and bend it so you have a little wire-framed table that is about 1-2 inches high. This will be an aerated table for your cakes to rest upon. This is necessary so that they don’t get water-logged when you begin to mist them on a daily basis.

This terrarium setup will help to insure approximately 80-85% relative humidity‚ which is a 15-20% reduction from before. This humidity reduction along with a reduction in ambient air temperature is the environmental change required to initiate “pinning” which is the initial formation of the actual young mushroom specimens.

The temperature should be dropped to about 70-75 degrees Fahrenheit. These changes should occur naturally in most settings when the cakes are removed from the incubation chamber to the terrarium. Important Note: There should also be a simple light source present. Normal daily light from a traditional lamp should be sufficient enough. Do not purposely place a light above the terrarium as this is not necessary. As mentioned before - mushrooms are not plants. Too much light will definitely be detrimental to their growing success. They only require just enough light to trigger the pinning response. This could take between 2-4 weeks to occur.

Once the cakes are placed in the terrarium - saran wrap should be placed over the top to seal them off from the air. You will have to pull the plastic wrap off everyday to allow for gas exchange‚ as well as a daily misting of a 90% to 10% distilled water to hydrogen peroxide solution. Note: You should still continue to mist the air first with a separate bottle that contains pure hydrogen peroxide (3% solution straight from the bottle). You should also continue to wear latex gloves or an equivalent substitute such as neoprene if you are allergic to latex as well as a dust mask for this procedure.

After a few short weeks you should start to see little dark dots beginning to appear on the surface of the cakes. These are the baby mushrooms beginning to form (pin heads). You should gradually decrease your misting volume as they start to enlarge, which will take anywhere from one to two weeks until full maturity.