Truffles are fragile, expensive, and rare food which are demanded by wealthy people in Europe for hundreds of years. Thus, starting truffle farming, growing, and cultivating truffles might be a smart way of making a good amount of effortless money. Continue reading to learn how to cultivate truffles in your own garden and take advantage of this chance. Here is the ultimate beginners guide to growing truffle.
What Is A Truffle Mushroom?
A truffle is a sort of fungus, the motherland of which as known is Southern Europe, basically Italy and France. The truffle is located in such a narrow region because it grows underground and very vulnerable to unfamiliar environmental conditions. And obviously, that’s the reason which makes truffle a rare and expensive product to be sold for thousands of dollars per pound.
There are two types of truffles, black truffle and white truffle. And among these two, although it can enhance the flavor of any dish you add it in the same way too, black truffle has a mild flavor and less expensive one.
No matter which one you would like to start growing, both of them need alkaline terrains.
So, both black and white truffles like similar kinds of tree roots.
Some of those trees to grow the best truffles are;
- Beech
- Birch
- Pine
- Poplar
- Hornbeam
- Oak
- Hazel
How to grow truffles in my own backyard?
If any of those forest trees are available around, let’s say in your backyard, you can start cultivating truffles for your business or just for personal consumption right away. The existence of those trees is a must, as the truffles have a vital connection with the roots of those trees to keep living and growing. So if you don’t have those trees around, you might need to go for a walk to the forest to allocate some of the forest tree roots to yourself.
You might need a good number of trees to start growing truffles as your depending on your needs to have a good harvest. 100 trees? Maybe 1000? That’s is totally based on your desire and expectations. Besides that, if you plan some kind of large amounts of truffle cultivation, you might also need to consider security precautions. As truffles are valuable and expensive prıducts, you will not be surprised to catch other people searching for them with their dogs.
How to find the right location to grow truffles?
One more vital point to consider is that those truffles need different seasons to keep their life cycle and keep growing larger. In other words, for efficient fertilization, truffles need to live in both warm and cold weather temperatures.
So, to predict the best truffle locations to start off growing truffles is not rocket science, yet although there are some success stories, having an efficient yield might be risky for the California climate. In contrast, Washington, Oregon, and similar temperatures are better for maximum thrifty. In general terms, for growing truffles, the US has significant fruitful lands.
How long does it take to grow truffles?
That’s actually one of the most challenging parts of producing truffles! Once you start off cultivating truffles, you need to be patient and remember the exact location where you placed them, as a successful yield possibly will take up to five years.
I know it sounds like a really long time to wait for a mushroom, but these are the most expensive truffle mushrooms, and at the end of the day, you will have such valuable products that are sold for ~$5000 per month pound. So starting off today, if you plot your terrain into five equal sections and cultivate new truffles in each of them one by one every following year, and keep cultivating again right after harvesting them, you might have a truffle factory at the end of the 5th year.
How to prepare the soil for cultivating truffles?
The best soil type you want to work on is fertile, and the optimal ph level for growing truffles is 7.9, while the 7.5 – 8.3 range is acceptable.
Suppose you know how to analyze the soil condition using one of the products available on the net. In that case, you might purchase one of the soil test kits to analyze the soil individually or send a sample to a local soil laboratory to analyze your soil. If you find out a ph imbalance with its natural ph balance, you might need to find a way to optimize the soil prior to cultivation.
A balanced ph level is mandatory for growing truffles. So, according to the test, if you have a low ph level, this makes things difficult, as you might need to optimize the pH level by spreading lime, which takes years. Even when you reached to required pH level, you will need to consolidate the lime to maintain the same pH level.
Water requirement of truffles:
Setting up a surface irrigation method.
Truffles need a lot of water. And if it’s not the ‘time,’ usually this issue is the one which makes many people give up the job even before starting it.
If you are living in a place depending on water sources and planning to start planting truffles on this terrain, I can not recommend you to do it. Depending on the weather, temperature, and humidity levels, truffles will need a range of minimum, half to one inch of water per tree and if you planted them too, let’s say 100 trees, it’s a lot of water.
So you need to set up an efficient irrigation system to keep watering truffles.
1. Planting and Taking Care of Trees
The next stage is to plant and care for the trees. Since planting ten trees is a lot of effort, the planting section is very lengthy. I can’t possibly imagine how exhausting planting 100 or even 1,000 trees would be.
So make sure you’re physically capable before taking on this challenge.
Then you’ll need to make sure that your trees are adequately hydrated, that lime is added to the soil for upkeep, that you trim your trees, that you weed between the trees, that you mulch, and that you fertilize.
Your most significant concern now is that weeds and grass will develop around your trees throughout the growth phase. They’ll scavenge resources that your trees need to grow. In the early phases of development, you can’t simply mow between the trees.
For the first two years or so, you’ll have to hoe the weeds out from between the trees. You may start moving after you’ve reached years 3-5.
It’s time to start harvesting your trees after you’ve planted them and taken care of them.
2. Train a Truffle Dog
The majority of individuals have discovered that training a truffle hound is the most efficient method to gather truffles.
Dogs can be taught to smell out truffles in the same way they can be trained to sniff out narcotics. This will save you a decent amount of time and effort searching the ground for truffles just to find none.
Worse, you may be missing truffles that you didn’t realize were there. More detailed information on how to teach a dog to sniff for truffles may be found here.
3. Look for Truffle Signs
After that, you’ll want to check for indications that truffles are developing near the base of your trees. Around year three or so, you’ll see ‘burnt spots’ around the bottom of the tree.
This simply implies that no grass or weeds are growing around the tree’s base. The reason for this is that truffles emit a natural pesticide that kills weeds.
If you observe this, as well as moss or puffballs growing on the tree, you may be pretty sure that truffles are growing under the base of the tree.
4. Harvesting Truffles
Finally, it will be ready to pick your truffles around years 5-8. If you want to produce truffles, you’ll need to make sure you reside somewhere with four distinct seasons. The reason for this is that truffles need a temperature shift to thriving.
Keep in mind, though, that ground that has been frozen for days on end is detrimental to the quality of the truffles.
Plus, you’ll be harvesting truffles throughout the winter. While snow is beneficial for keeping truffles warm, too much ice is detrimental to quality and harvesting.
Digging the truffles out of the frozen ground is obviously not an option.
When winter arrives in years 5-8, you’ll want to dig at the tree’s base until you can take out the truffles that have been growing there quietly for years.
The Pros and Cons
There are advantages and disadvantages to growing every crop. You should be aware of these while working with truffles, particularly given the required amount of effort and money.
What is Good About Growing Truffles:
1. A large profit
Truffles are obviously uncommon in most areas. That is why they are sold for such a high price.
So, theoretically, you may earn handsomely from your crop. Truffles may be the crop for you if you’re searching for a profitable investment.
2. After the first few years, there is very little care required.
Truffles require a lot of effort at first. However, after you get your space set up and they have survived the first few years, you will just need to keep the grass trimmed and add little lime to the soil to maintain pH.
What are the CONS About Growing Truffles:
Every advantage generally comes with a disadvantage. Truffles are no exception. As a result, you’ll want to think about these things before diving in.
1. Growing Truffles Needs Quite a Bit of Time
Truffle cultivation takes a long period. In reality, approximately half of all truffle farms fail because of individuals weary of putting their time and investment into something for years and years with no results.
As a result, you must be prepared to be patient for a period of 5-8 years since they require time. Another reason they charge such a high price is because of this.
2. A significant amount of investment is needed upfront.
When you decide to grow truffles, you must spend a significant amount of money. According to my study, most trees cost $20 or more per tree.
You’ll also need to purchase a large quantity of lime and put up an irrigation system. Many individuals have spent upwards of $20,000 on truffles.
Now, once they start producing, you should be able to recoup your investment in a year’s harvest (or so I’ve been informed.) However, when you have to wait eight years to know whether you’ll receive a return on your investment, that’s a huge risk to take.
So now you know how to grow truffles on your own. As you can see, there are high risks, but there are also a lot of benefits.
With the knowledge provided here, you should be able to make a more confident choice in this effort.
However, I would like to hear from you. Have you considered starting a truffle farm? What was your experience like if you did? Do you have any truffles in your garden right now? If so, do you have any advice for someone who is thinking about going into the industry?
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