When the fruit body of a mushroom grows to its full height, it starts to produce spores. These spores fall out of the shroom cap when they are fully matured. Eventually, the spores start to germinate when they get in touch with a fitting nutrient solution. An agar medium in a petri dish is generally utilized for spore germination in mushroom cultivation.

To provide the favourable environmental conditions, the temperature and air humidity are regulated. In mushroom cultivation the mycelium (vegetative part of a fungus) is placed inside a growing room or a propagator.

Quite interestingly, you will find positive (+) and negative (−) polarized spores. They will initiate germination autonomously. The moment such stages are formed; the mushroom will absorb water from its mycelium and expand usually by inflating preformed cells that took several days to form in the primordia ( an organ or tissue in its earliest recognizable stage of development )

Subsequently, rhizomorph mycelium strains are chosen and utilized for further cultivation. Similarly, there are even more ephemeral mushrooms, like Parasola plicatilis, that appears overnight and usually vanish by late afternoon on a sultry day after rainfall. The primordia that is formed at moist ground, under the thatch and wet logs after heavy rainfall grows mushrooms to full size in a few hours. These fully grown mushrooms vanish after releasing the spores.

However, it is important to note that not all mushrooms expand overnight. Some mushrooms grow very slowly and add tissue to their fruit bodies by growing from the edges of the colony For example, Pleurotus nebrodensis grows slowly. And because of this and to some extent due to human collection, it has now become endangered.

Even though mushroom fruiting bodies do not live long, the underlying mycelium generally last for a longer period. A colony of Armillaria solidipes in Malheur National Forest in the United States is believed to be 2,400 years old and spreads to an estimated area of 2,200 acres (8.9 km2). Most of the fungus is underground and in decaying wood or dying tree roots in the form of white mycelia combined with black shoelace-like rhizomorphs that bridge colonized separated woody substrates.

Depending on the type of mushroom you would like to grow, you can select the spores accordingly. These spores can be placed outside or inside your house according to your convenience. And as per your choice, you need to know the suitable climatic conditions required to cultivate the mushroom. If you follow the necessary basic steps, cultivating mushrooms at home can be a very interesting hobby.