Monster of suburbia – massive Pleurotus ostreatus find (cloned)

Driving through a random street in the suburbs in the foothills of the Dandenongs and we spotted a monster!

What a massive and amazing creature! Two massive fruitbodies of a Pleurotus species growing on a stump. The size of the stems were more like king oysters than other types of oysters.

Not only did it smell aniseedy like a wild oyster should, but the stems almost smelled nutty like a birch bolete.

The feature that caught our eye with the most interest beyond the size of these monsters was the criss-crossed gills on the stipe – a feature used by some mycologists to distinguish Pleurotus australis from other oysters. However DNA sequencing demonstrated that this is another local ostreatus variant.

Smell and flavours were beyond superb. Easily the best edible I have ever foraged. And the clones have gone gangbusters!

As we haven’t actually test-grown this strain yet or confirmed its DNA we don’t yet have it for sale but it wont be long before we have met both of those milestones!

As explained previously, at Selby Shrooms we test grow all our strains before sale, we back them up and two of them are actually provided to us by a commercial grower so we can confirm their vitality and domestication.