Let me first begin by saying that I am not getting paid or incentivized for this review in any way. This is solely based on my personal experience for the last 2 years of buying Delicious and Magical all-in-one 3 lbs & 5 lbs substrate bags for both the gourmet and psilocybin mushrooms. I have tried three other companies I'm not going to mention names because this review will not be approved but the results weren't nearly as good or one company I purchased two bags and had them replaced twice and all of them had contamination. I am not new to this because I also do tissue culture and it requires extreme cleanliness and prevention of cross-contamination so I'm very familiar with the process and I know what I'm doing and I'm 100% positive It wasn't human error meaning mine but the substrate was contaminated. I also tried a half a dozen different liquid culture and spores and also had terrible results until I found Booming Acres by accident simply watching videos on Google and YouTube of different mycologists and one of them recommended to either make your own substrate or to purchase it from Booming Acres. So, I did just that and after speaking to Howard who is the CEO of the company and very pleasant and professional and extremely helpful individual, he recommended to try FullCanopy for psilocybin liquid cultures and for gourmet liquid cultures he recommended to try his. So I purchased two bags of Delicious and two bags of Magical all-in-one substrate bags and Blue Oyster, King Oyster, and Lion's Mane from him and Golden Teacher from FullCanopy And I was amazed at the quality of the substrate and liquid cultures I didn't have a single problem so I was definitely sold. Then I purchased eight more bags of Magical all-in-one bags and six more of the Delicious bags and wanted to try B+ FullCanopy didn't have it so I called Howard and he said he recommends trying SporesMD because he was adding them as one of his affiliates that he recommends using and says if I get a bad culture he would replace the substrate which was pleasantly surprising information. I did just that and unfortunately my first purchase of B+ got contaminated and both the culture and substrate were replaced without giving me any hard time at all and I even offered to pay for shipping for both items and both places told me not to worry about it and sent me replacements and paid for shipping and sent the tracking information and the replacements worked perfectly and I had three great flushes as you can see in the pictures I provided. I prefer liquid culture over spores because spores take twice as long or even longer in some cases to colonize versus liquid culture takes about 2 weeks to get to 50% colonized and then even at 30% I have mixed the grains and the substrate to fully colonized and it worked just as good as when I waited until grains got colonized to 50% mycelium which takes about 2 weeks and then after mixing substrate and grains together if it takes another 2 weeks for the whole brick to become covered with white mycelium and then it's time to initiate fruiting which I have tried using a monotub and without it and exposing the brick out of the bag but it's unnecessary and even having substrate to fill up the mono tub I thought would give me higher yield but it provides the same amount as when I simply fruited them inside the 5 lbs all-in-one bag and much less chance of getting contamination so I continue fruiting them inside the bags and I don't have space in my tent so I use a monotub with a couple of inches of perlite at the bottom tray and I add water and then a sheet of tin foil to keep proper level of moisture inside the tub and I put rubber bands around the substrate to force fruiting upwards instead of wasting energy on mushrooms growing from the sides and from the bottom only to die before they are fully developed because of not enough space and that would reduce your yield so by adding rubber bands you don't get any growth on the sides or from the bottom and they all fruit upwards and you can see the pictures and it's obvious the yields are massive ๐ I have sent Howard close to 100 emails already asking a ton of questions and providing pictures and asking for advice and every single time Howard goes above and beyond to provide as detailed information as possible to make sure I get the best possible results and never did not answer my question or told me to stop bothering him lol. Because of him and his detailed instructions that are very easy to understand I have amazing results and now I no longer need his help for the most part and I am having the best results I ever had. I can't thank him enough for all of his help. I have friends and their friends constantly asking me where I get my substrate and Blue Oyster and King Oyster and Lion's Mane cultures and I send everyone to Booming Acres I always tell them to please take my advice and don't do what I did and waste time and money on anything else because they will be disappointed if they don't take my advice, and now every time we speak they thank me every single time ๐. When it comes to value, Booming Acres has the best prices and besides having very competitive pricing they have the best quality that I had the chance to try and use and he didn't stop there and very often offers 20% off, 40% off, and uncertain holidays like Black Friday or Christmas or 4th of July and possibly other ones I can't recall is when he goes up to 60% off which is unheard of. If you like to grow a lot of different varieties and need multiple bags of substrate, then he also has five bags options for the price of four bags plus if you get them during a holiday you will pay for two bags and to get five of them or pay for three and get five but even the deal Pay for four bags and receive five is still an outstanding deal and very cost effective and if you use his affiliates And you happen to get contamination, he will always honor his warranty and will replace that bag and liquid culture if what his gourmet culture without any questions asked. You should also then contact that affiliate company if you purchased their liquid culture and tell them of the contamination and that Howard CEO of Booming Acres is replacing the substrate and that you would like to get a replacement of that culture and just like Howard they will replace it no questions asked. The last time this happened to me not only Howard sent me a new bag but refused my offer to pay for shipping and I reached out to the affiliate and they too sent me a replacement and when I open the bag I was pleasantly surprised to see my replacement and an extra 10 mL liquid culture of a different strain ๐ which I didn't ask for and wasn't informed and they just included an extra one just because. That was such a nice gesture and once again shows how professional these guys are and how much they care about their customers' satisfaction. If you have never grown mushrooms before and would like to try even if you don't have space for a tent, you don't really need one and you don't really need a monotub either, I highly recommend reaching out to Howard via email and he will respond within 24 hours with answers to your questions and any recommendations he thinks that would be of help to you. Growing mushrooms is really easy and the only thing you need to make sure is use gloves and alcohol and mask to prevent cross-contamination and providing proper temperature and humidity for the mushroom variety you're growing because each variety needs different parameters. Some mushrooms prefer 60 to 65ยฐ temperature Fahrenheit while others would grow fine at 70 to 75ยฐ and humidity for the most part should be high between 75 and 95% with some like to be closer to 95% while others would be fine at 75 to 85% and Howard will definitely point you in the right direction and tell you exactly what you need to get excellent results. I hope this review helps make an informed and educated decision. Happy Growing!๐
