The cultivation of mushrooms has a plethora of medicinal health benefits

As God intended. Let's go.

Well, hello, hello. This is Dr. Angie Ferrella and this is looking for healing radio. We are so excited to have you today.

And we have a really special guest. I'm really, you know, I've been doing a series on healthy living and organic living over the past couple of weeks. If you look back on my podcast, you'll find that I went over organic labeling and what is greenwashing.

And so if you are new to the health journey and you really don't understand labels, that is one to listen to. The second one that I did was on

Let's the herb nerd lady. I love this woman. She was great. She gave us lots of tinctures and she gave us some recipes to follow. And the third one, which was last week, we did raw milk. And I interviewed a raw milk dairy farmer and rancher. And we talked a little bit about regenerative farming.

Well, this week, my special guest is Kevin Jackson, Jr., who I've met at multiple farmers markets and all my listeners know that I'm kind of a farmers market nerd now. And

And Kevin is a super uber cool guy who owns and operates his company called roots and rhizzo, which basically is a mushroom, right? Mostly mushroom derivative type of products.

Yes. So a lot of mushroom and herbal products, just a lot of natural medicine type products pretty much.

That is awesome. So tell my listeners, how did you get into this? Like what spurge you one day to just go, you know what these mushrooms look pretty cool. Let me see what I can do with them.

I mean, I don't know if it's time I got to tell you that's a long story. But I mean, I guess it started with like, I've always had a connection to nation since I was a kid. And like my daddy used to have like 28 years. We used to go to that all the time. So like I kind of grew up already in the wild.

But then I let kind of like society pivot me, you know, away from that and more into a society of two things. So then it was a journey of like trying to get back to my roots trying to figure out, you know, how to get that that peace and calmness again. So then I wanted to start, you know, growing stuff. And then it started with

listen, I mean, I guess it's not bad. It's still a herb. It started with cannabis. I don't know more so it don't matter. But back in the day started with that. Then it went to like house plants and then outdoor vegetables and then outdoor herbs. And then I would be hiking a lot. And I would always see like all mushrooms and stuff like that. And so then I looked into grow kids. And I seen that they have mushroom grow kids are like, oh, like that's perfect.

So then I got it. And then I grew my first mushrooms. And then like the journey started from there. Like it's just on stop literally.

Like do you forage? Did you like when you were walking around hiking and stuff? Do you actually forage?

Yeah. Now I do it initially. It was just a lot of learning because it was like you got a lot of like medicinal mushrooms or choice edible mushrooms that I don't have. But then you still have a lot of poisonous mushrooms.

And so a lot of the initial aspect was learning the difference. So I wasn't buzzing me and my family. But now, you know, I can decide for so much.

So it's really good. So yeah, I can forage like Rishi Turkey to chant trails like just a whole bunch.

That's so awesome. I think that's really one of those things that I really enjoy is learning different things. I went to this was many years ago. I went to Belize and they actually had this hiking tour guide.

I guess you would say who was very into medicinal plants, right? So every time we took like five steps, he would say, Oh, you see this on the tree. This is for you know, whatever.

And I was on it like white on rice. I was so excited about it. People in my group were just like, Angie, come on. Let's go. We gotta go.

And you're like, no, tell me more. Yeah, it was really neat. And so, you know, Google lens is a is a really fun thing for me now.

So I just take pictures of stuff. And I have been getting into a medicinal garden. I grew medicinal garden in my at my house and in, you know, just large bins kind of thing.

That's the toying with that. So yeah, it's fun. So tell us a little bit about can you can you kind of like take your what's your favorite mushroom and why and what do you use it for?

So, well, I guess my favorite mushroom is a mushroom that we can cultivate indoors because, okay, so you got like micro riser, fun guys, the public fun guy and then parasitic fun guy.

And like, the probic means like they eat deadwood and that's the kind of mushrooms that we can cultivate indoors. So that's like oysters, lions, man.

But like my favorite pretty much grows off of like the roots of living trees. So it's a micro riser fun guy. And it's called the chanterelles. And I don't know why I mean, I have wanted to add it on my face. Like I love it that much. Like it's definitely one of my top tier ones. It's just so unique in its aspects.

You can how it how it forms, how it comes out, the color formation, the flavor profile, like you can grill it. So I'll say it, they get right.

Pretty much like it's phenomena.

And it actually like grows from the root of the trees.

Yeah, so they have a symbiotic relationship with trees, the mycelium does. And so the mycelium basically goes and gets further nutrients for the trees and the trees.

Provided with sugar and sugar is like glucose is one of like mycelium's favorite things. So they just basically have a really cool symbiotic relationship.

And so every few years, every time the season is right, where we have a good like heavy rain storm on top of a liqueur weather, then they'll come up like from the bottom of like oak trees and things like that. And you'll see you can follow the mycelium rain that's around the mushroom and it'll pretty much be like mushrooms popping up in an exact ring around that mushroom is really crazy. I mean around that tree. So it's really crazy.

So those are the ring mushrooms like in your grass. No, so it's not, but that's just how mycelium grows. So basically mycelium grows out in ring formation.

And once it gets a blockage to where it can't grow no more, that's where it will send up as mushrooms in order to further the chance of those mushrooms spreading sports further and then they can keep colonizing the area.

Oh, cool. See, I knew you were a plethora of information about this stuff. This is cool. No, this is cool because I think a lot of people misunderstand mushrooms. I grew up. I know this sounds really strange. But I grew up outside of a couple of different omniscient communities and that's their that's their go to raise mushrooms in Pennsylvania. They they grow mushrooms. That's like a huge industry for them.

Okay. Yeah. And so, you know, and I don't know what kind because I was a kid. I don't know. There are mushrooms. I was like, okay.

So with the mushroom, like I know that you when you have your display and I would highly recommend people, when you go to a farmer's market, try to find people like Kevin because they're like you just learned just five minutes ago.

When he opened his mouth, he's a plethora of information and he can actually show you, you know, this is this is what this mushroom looks like. This is what it does. And when you do your mushroom, like you do brain caps, you do teas, you do tinctures like creams and stuff like that.

When you prepare your mushrooms, how do you do it? Do you freeze dry them? Do you dehydrate them? Do you just crush them? What do you do?

So a lot of the times, like, well, with the mushrooms in general, mushrooms have a cell wall called kayton and like our bodies don't digest kayton, like it takes, it's a struggles to break kayton down. So at that point, in order to get the medicinal benefits out of the mushrooms, we have to treat it with a heat, which will basically break that kayton down.

We do a water extraction, which pulls out like 85, 90% of the medicinal benefits of the mushroom that goes into the so it'll be grinded up pretty much soaked in water. And then that whole mush gets put into the dehydrator.

And then that gets dehydrated until there's no more and then that gets ground down and that becomes like the powder base for like the powders or the capsule and stuff like that.

But if it's just dried mushrooms, then I just really shredded and dehydrated because at that point, that's for the user to, you know, cook and prepare and whatever, however they want to use it.

Awesome. So when you're, when you are doing the water extraction, do you have to use like distilled water? I would assume, right?

Yeah, it's reverse osmosis water as clean as we can possibly get it, because I don't even trust it. And then like, especially in a sick man, like I don't trust our water at all.

I mean, he's in so.

But yeah, we just know how to go. Yeah, now there's a reason why people have water filters.

Now, does the pH of the water affect the mushrooms?

Not not to an extent, because most of the water at that point is neutral pH. So that has no, you know, real effect on it. So like whenever we're doing,

we're creating the mushroom blocks, which are basically what the mushrooms of my cellium consumes, that's using the same water.

And that's what they're consuming. And they fruit beautifully. So I mean, I guess they love it.

I mean, it was working with rainwater, like low acid water. So I mean, it'd be cool.

So if you do you think that if you used, I'm just throwing this out, you may not know the answer, but because I'm such a bougie water girl.

I like my alkaline water. I walk around with my own alkaline water all the time, because we have a filter. And so alkaline, that's why I was asking because I'm like, oh, maybe I could do this.

I can walk around my Google lens and forage and then try to make some, I mean, I bought this stuff from you, obviously.

But, you know, sometimes I like to just experiment and see, you know, like, hey, maybe can I do this? I don't know.

And honestly, I don't know. I feel like mushrooms are very adaptable. So it's not like it would have a negative effect on them. Like they're not really.

They're picking and choosing as far as like competition, like they don't want much competition, but outside of competition, like competing bacteria or other fungal.

They are really adaptable. So they might thrive. I don't know. I haven't tried it. I put the experiments in the test for sure.

Now, when you do, because you make brain caps, you make that micro bacon, which by the way, my kid loves and she eats it straight.

You know, you make a lot of different products in your lines and stuff. And so it's just kind of fun, because I think a lot of people now understand the medicinal benefits to mushrooms.

And, you know, they hear about all the different things. And, you know, I, there's mushroom brain blends you see, like even commercially, like cross the board.

There's of those kinds of blends. And they're showing you that, you know, the Rishi mushroom and the, you know, and the lines mean those are two very, very popular ones that they use all the time in, you know, nutraceuticals and natural food stores in the commercial side.

What, when you, let's just kind of play a little game, like if someone says, you know, I have brain fog and I'm just really tired. What mushroom would you, would you tell them?

Man, I just, every week, you can't feel me thinking I'm like a herbalist or something. I'm like, no, I'm not. I just, you know, I just grow it and understand it.

But if you did come and ask me that question, I would clear the point into the lines, man, just because that's the number one.

I guess currently being studied and researched mushroom as far as like neurological improvements.

So like it's shown to repair damaged nerve cells in the brain. And at that point, that helps with like focus, memory, alertness, brain fog, just a lot of cognitive things.

Yeah, that would, that would be, I would tell you, I have lines, man, 100% lines, man, no fillers, no additives.

And then I would recommend either the powder that you can add to smooth this coffees, teas, things like that.

The one of the capsules or the tinctures or the teas because they have them in there. So just a lot of ways of kind of putting that, that good brain health out them.

Yeah, that's awesome. And you know, your brain caps, is that your lion's mane?

Yes, ma'am.

So you have those, we have a couple of them.

I slide them into Johns, you know, every day.

Yeah, between that and Michael Bacon, you know, we're pretty much keeping you in business.

Then the, when you're talking about Rishi, right, Rishi seems to be one that's popping up a little bit here.

What are some of the good medicinal benefits of Rishi?

So Rishi is really like ancient Chinese medicine type mushrooms.

So it's like nicknamed the mushroom of immortality.

So technically, like I can give you like five medicinal benefits, but it's been studied with like over 30 medicinal benefits.

So like it's a very, very strong medicinal, very fibrous mushroom.

So it's a mushroom you can't really eat, but you can extract the medicinal benefits from the mushrooms.

So it's really good at boosting like it's shown to let me not, you know, watch my words.

It's shown amazing improvements that being able to boost the white blood cell production,

which in turn would help with like fighting infections, attacking cancer cells within the body.

It's shown to like reset the gut microbiome.

Just a lot of phenomenal things.

Aiding in sleep.

So it really helps you get and stay into a deep sleep, not a deep sleep, but a relaxed sleep.

Right.

No, no.

You go, baby, you're going to be all right.

And it's very restorative, like so it really does repairs on the body overnight.

Like it's absolutely a phenomenal mushroom.

And there's so many types as well.

So like, it's really interesting.

So Rishi has multiple like sila or whatever.

Yeah.

So like you, they're all genoderma, but they're all genoderma species.

So like locally, we have like sisile, genoderma, kersia, genoderma.

So that's what we have.

Yeah.

But like what I grow is genoderma multipliedly, which is antlerishi.

And so, um, it's a type of Rishi that grows upward, kind of creating antler type design,

like, like, yeah, it pumps out.

So it's a, it's a very, that's the one that I typically bring out.

I have on display at the market.

So that's really cool.

That is awesome.

Well, in our next segment, we will deep dive into a few of these other fun blends that you do.

And meanwhile, I just want to remind my listeners that you can go to the America out loud shop

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This, um, I know that, you know, I've been trying a few different things on that.

And so I would recommend the bear bar.

Try that.

It's a savory little snack bar.

And we will be back in just a moment.

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And we're back.

Thank you for hanging out with us today.

I have Kevin Jackson, Jr.

Who is the brain behind roots and rhizo.

This is going to be a really fun conversation.

I hope you guys tune in.

Not only do you tune in, but I hope you pass this on to your friends and neighbors.

Kevin knows mushrooms like no hunger.

I thought it pretty much stopped at baby bells, but what do I know?

We have, you know, mushrooms have been, I would say in the last two or three years,

even on the medical front, because as a physician, I use a lot of nutraceuticals.

I love nutraceuticals.

I would rather use something natural than something that is synthetic

or made it processed in a lab.

So I try to use even things that are derived from nature

that may become nutraceutical if you do.

So I'm totally fascinated.

I'll sit there and, you know, I'm reading your signs and people think I'm weird

because I'm reading all the fine print on everything.

That's how you learn.

And I know, you know, this is, you really have this down.

I hate to say to a science, but it really is.

You have kind of perfected your craft.

When you first started, because you said you started getting into all different kinds of growing

of different plants and things of that nature.

And then you fell into mushrooms.

Do you kind of pick and choose what mushrooms you want to grow?

Or is it something like, well, you know, I know there's these five.

Let's just say different types.

And they have these different properties.

These are the five I'm going to stick to.

Or do you kind of search out and find other things to look for too?

So I guess initially, well, I initially am still currently.

It's really a blend of what mushrooms produce the quickest.

And what mushrooms grow in your environment.

So like, being where we're at now, like, I can't necessarily grow inoki mushrooms

because they need to grow in like 30, 40, 50 degree weather.

We don't got that like not from the long period of time.

So then I have to stick to cultures that are more native to here

or more forgiven as far as like temperature or fluctuations.

And I committed to, I mean, the high humidity is cool,

but like the mold, the amount of mold that we have out here compared to other states.

Like, it's a lot of competition and different aspects that the mushrooms have to deal with.

So I'm more of picking best genetics, best cultures that can grow out here.

The quickest growers, stuff like that.

So there's some cultures that I want to grow, but I don't have the time form

because they take a while.

Like I rarely grow shataki because shataki takes like six to ten months

to get the whole thing done.

Whereas oyster is lion's mane, chestnuts, peopinos.

I can get those done within a two to four month frame.

So I'm going to have to go more with those, you know, as far as space wires.

Oh, that's kind of cool.

So is your mushroom farm for less lack of better term?

Do you do most of your mushrooms outside or do you have like a hot house?

Or how do you do this?

Yes, and the whole thing is indoor cultivated.

So it's like a currently I have a two car garage converted into like a entire mushroom

like work lab.

I guess you can say so it has like a lot of racks that hold like 400 different mushrooms

from blocks has a 10 by 10 fruit and 10 that holds roughly,

I say like 250 at a time, 250 mushroom blocks at a time.

And then it has a separate section that has a flow hood,

which is providing sterilized air whenever I have to do inoculations and transfers

and stuff like that.

And so it's kind of all operated out of there.

You got like different pressure triggers and all Americans for sterilization.

So this is doing sterilizations, putting in in front of the flow hood,

doing inoculations, letting them colonize on racks until they ready to fruit

and then putting them into the fruit and tent, which is like automated like lights and humidity

and temperature and stuff like that.

So kind of created a micro environment that they grow out of.

That is super cool.

Do you teach people how to do this?

Like do you tell them come to my garage?

So let me show you how this is done.

It's not even a garage.

Like it's really a whole like they did something else,

but they converted it.

So like you would never know it was a garage.

I just know it's a garage because of the size of it.

But like it's a regular room like completely like insulated like type boom.

So I used to like last year, I did a few classes.

But it's a little tough to try to cram as much mushroom information

in such a small timeframe.

So I have to like readjust on timeframe or like it's just like a two day class

or like what?

Because like it's a lot of information.

Like I felt like I left people off with a lot of lack of certain things

that could have really changed or helped them.

Yeah.

So how did you start like with what mushroom did you start with?

Did you just start this with one?

So I bought a couple cultures when I first started.

So I started like I started learning how to grow mushrooms.

October of 2022.

But then I started actually growing it two months later.

December of 2022.

So I like binge learns for for two months and figured out how to do the entire

process.

And then I bought like the same blue oysters that I'm using today.

The same pearl oysters that I'm using today.

The same chestnuts that I'm using today.

And then Black Poplar, which is Pio Pino.

And we had I did those four.

I had a little still air box for for contamination.

And I annihilated agar plates, which is like like different mediums

that the mycelium can grow on.

And it kind of just started from there.

And if they was healthy, we kept the journey growing.

So it was like four stages until you get to the fruit and stage.

So it's a lot, man, it's a lot.

That was really awesome.

I mean, I think a lot of people will find this fascinating.

And you know, you put a lot of time and effort into it, obviously.

And there's just so much to learn and so many things to do with that.

And so when you're when you're going through it.

And you're trying to discern, you know, yes, you want rapid growers.

That would make sense because you're in a regenerative environment, right?

So do you when you start and you said that the ones that you started with,

you're still cultivating and regenerating every, you know, up until now,

which is what four years later.

Exactly.

So they're pretty hearty.

And it sounds like, you know, not only are they hearty that they propagate pretty well, right?

But I'm more of Southeast Houston.

So people know that in Southeast Houston, it's just stinking hot.

Most of it's hurting and it's superhuman.

We live in a tropical climate.

So you think it would be perfect for mushrooms anyway.

But you you still have to control for different things.

And I understand that as well.

So when we're the number one issue, like the way that mold is like the aggressive,

the aggressiveness of mold, like mold colonizes quicker than my ceilium does.

So mold trying to do an outdoor grow with basically just ruin your entire grow,

because it will attach to it loves the same medium that the fun guy loves.

And it's going to beat the fun guy to that medium basically.

So yeah, that's awesome.

So when you're when you're doing the when you're making your,

not making them, but like as you're as you're going through,

like do you have kind of a cycle within your space where you go from start to finish

where you just kind of rotate them.

Like here's here's the ones that I just propagated.

Now I move them over to this space and it's, you know, growth time and then.

Yeah, so like as far as like the still having the same culture,

that's because of like you have eight, you have four stages.

So you got the agar, then you have the grain, then you have the, uh,

substrate, and then you have the actual fruit and stage.

So a lot of like culture, culture preservation,

art, uh, comes from doing agar plates, which is just, uh,

petri dishes that are made that we create a agar mix,

agar sugar mix, and then sterilize that and put it into these petri dishes.

And now we take mycelium from other plates or even from a fresh mushroom,

and we'll put it on that on those, uh, on those first plates,

and they'll grow up mycelium.

And that mycelium, if they make and continue to grow and become healthy,

that now becomes a healthy culture that you can put in the refrigerator

to save you for like up to a year and then kind of just retransfer

from that same culture to keep that lineage going.

Uh, and so you have to go from the agar plate, uh,

plates once they're colonized, you go to a grain,

so like a old brain, rye, a millet, any kind of brain like that.

And that's what the mycelium initially gets like a big,

uh, meal from pretty much a big colonization comes from that.

Now that has to, once they eat all of that,

and there isn't no bacteria contamination or mold contamination,

then we go to the, um,

the substrate stage, which is hardwood and supplement of either soy or wheat

or, um, different, you know, grains of that nation.

And so then from that sillage, that's one of mycelium,

finally eats all of that.

So you have to inoculate those grains into the substrate.

And then the mycelium eats that.

And this is the meal that makes them big and strong and, and very aggressive.

And then at this point, once they colonize their bags,

and they can't colonize anymore, then they push mushrooms out as a signal

to like continue the, the lineage pretty much.

So what's all, it's a lot when it comes to like how it like has to be switched out.

So basically like when a new bags for me and it's basically all in rotation

to where like the colonized bags are going into the fruit and block,

the fruit, I mean, to the fruit intent.

The ones from the fruit intent are going out into the, into the spent blocks yard.

Um, the ones that were on a guard are going to grain at that point.

And some grains are going to substrate.

And it's kind of just that four way cycle constantly.

Well, because you said that it from start to finish is about two months.

Yeah, like two to four months roughly just depends on like,

because the agar stage is the longest stage.

So that's the, that's the stage that the mycelium takes up to a month.

Just to colonize just depending on how healthy that mycelium is.

So once you get past the agar stage, you get to the brain stage,

and that thing's happened within like three to four weeks.

But it's making sure that initial stage is done.

So combined. Yeah, it all, it can stretch like on average two to four weeks

for the common mushrooms that we grow like oyster's,

lions, man, stuff like that.

But like easy six to ten months off of off of like shatakeys and stuff like that.

That are very slow colonizers that broke completely different.

I got some called shataki in the fruit intent right now when they they got done they got

immaculated last year and then just now going to fruit play it's crazy.

Wow.

Yeah.

So you do the shataki you just don't do a lot of them because they take so long so it's

hard to take them in.

Yeah.

So because of that exactly so because of my limited space, shout out to anybody, you got

to me.

I need some of them now.

But yeah, because of my limited space, I can't store shataki as you know as much because

I don't have that much space to create that much of a backstock for shataki so you would

have to have like like we do like big racks like the little metal racks that does some wheels

and each shelf holds like maybe eight to ten substrate blocks at a time.

And so you would need like maybe three or four of those racks dedicated solely to shataki

in order to like cultivate it on a consistent basis.

This is so fascinating.

I kind of nerd out with you on this because this is, um, this is not something that everyone

does, right?

And it's not something that, um, you know, when you go to a farmer's markets, you don't

normally, you see sprouts, you know, things like that, but you don't see mushrooms.

And so when I saw you and with the mushrooms, I'm like, this is cool because you, it's

not something you see every day.

You obviously have a passion for it.

And I really love that when people find something that they can hone in on like, like you're

not doing everything, you're just doing mushrooms for the most part.

And that in itself speaks volumes about how knowledgeable you are, how precise you are

in the way that you're doing your things.

And then you've grown a business out of it, obviously, that is pretty, you know, it seems

like you're doing really well.

It seems like you're really successful.

And you know, there's a lot of work that goes into this and you're pretty much a one-man

show.

Um, you know, I know your wife, she a little bit, but still it's, it's, it's a lot of work.

Yeah.

It's a lot of research.

I've got three kids on top of it, home, school, and so like, yeah, it makes you up to like

squeeze it all in.

Yeah.

That's awesome.

And I know my listeners are probably super excited about learning more from, from this

too.

And so we are going to be talking about this also and, and go into a little bit more in

our next session.

And one of the things that I know most people want to know is like, you know, we'll, at

which we'll talk about next time is really talking about how, how do you find the resources

to learn this stuff?

And I think when you talk to people that are passionate about growing or, you know, getting

back to nature or growing something very specifically to make a difference, um, it usually stems

from a personal experience, well, you know, when you're so passionate about the mushrooms

being such preciseness, there's, you have this preciseness about exactly how the process

goes and how things are going.

So in our next segment, I think people are really going to want to know a little bit deeper

on the process itself.

And so, um, I think you and I will, we'll really try to do a deep dive as much as we can

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And we are back with Mr. Kevin Jackson.

He is a super cool dude.

He knows pretty much more, I'm pretty sure you know more about mushrooms than most people

know about themselves.

That's the one.

And this is, I mean, I'm learning so much, I don't, you know, I know that our listeners

are probably going gaga over this because if I'm geeking out and learning so much about

this, I know they are too because this is the kind of audience that we have.

They just love learning about health and wellness and how to do for themselves being

self-sufficient.

And the fact that you have an entire business from start to finish from growing your product

to packaging and labeling and selling your product, all, you know, that is something

that is, that's the true American spirit number one number two.

It seems like everyone that I've been talking to lately, that is into this, you know, health

and wellness and just getting back to nature group.

Many of them are parents that are homeschoolers, which anyone that knows me knows that I love

the homeschooling community and I know, I always tell my parents that are super parents

and super teachers that, that the homeschoolers are going to save the world.

That's pretty much what I tell them.

And it's true.

And, you know, we were homeschoolers as well, you know, so we homeschooled our girls as

well.

So I have great admiration for people that are doing that.

Now are your kids into growing the mushrooms too?

Like do you bring them into the operation?

Yeah, they've been in it since like, to early days.

So like, if we go like foraging, like they can point out mushrooms and name mushrooms,

identify mushrooms, quicker than I can, I don't know.

I didn't see it.

Let me, like my eyes don't know, but like, yes, they already are into that.

And like my oldest, he's nine and he had just did an assignment, a writing assignment,

I think like a couple of days ago.

And I checked it and he was like, when I turn 15, I want to work for roots and I was like,

oh, like it just, it was honored because like, he loved and always asked questions and

they're always curious and always trying to sneak in the mushroom room, which is a

no key zone.

So yeah, it's a very interesting dynamic with them.

So when do you think they're going to be ready to join you in this quest?

Oh, honestly, whatever they said, they want to do it.

I'm down.

I need some help.

Shake these substrate bags for me.

But a lot of it is like the tedious things are like, they try to help every now and then

especially with like the spent blocks aspects, like they help a lot with that, which saves

me like two hours.

So I'll take it.

Oh my God.

Appreciate it.

So, but yeah, so I'm, I'm slowly working them into getting into more of doing the labor

part.

You know, you just gave me an idea to where I was.

So yeah.

They're going to be, they're going to be in it soon.

Yeah.

I mean, you know, I'd come from a very, very, very blue collar family.

You know, my mom was an immigrant.

My father's family were immigrants.

So I think at starting at nine, I was in, my dad was a builder.

So I was pushing brooms or rolling a carpet that was, you know, that was getting torn

out, picking up.

You know, I did all that stuff.

I remember doing that one.

I was a kid and I think that builds character.

I think kids don't know how to work anymore.

I mean, that's just my opinion.

But I think it's a, it's a great opportunity, especially if he's really into it and, and

starting to show interest, you know, even just helping you package and putting the stickers

on and, you know, making signs and things.

These kids are really bright and sharp and, you know, in a service community like that.

And I think that's something that is really important and you're, you're, you're a beacon

of light to your kids showing them that hard work does pay off and that doing something

outside the box pays off because this is not, not everyone is growing mushrooms for medicinal

purposes.

Not all of them.

And now the scale that's sustainable best of stuff is part like, even if you are like,

there's a lot of, you know, novice like interested people and shout out to them, but like,

the level to be able to make it sustainable turns it into a whole different growing aspect

like.

And that's where the tough part comes in is to keep that going.

But on the other point that you was saying, yeah, I had a fellow mushroom farmer.

He actually just got out of the game, but he grew up in the midnight community.

So he would explain to me how he started working at eight, nine years old, you know, and

building.

Like you explain with you, so it was like, yeah, it definitely resonates because I see

that option.

Yeah.

I mean, back in the old days, that's why he had large families was to get a workforce.

Exactly.

Now for sure.

Exactly.

Yeah.

And I think too, you know, with, with, there's a lot of things, different aspects and stuff.

Like when you are making your brain caps, for instance, like, I'm looking at your brain

caps right now because they're right in front of my eyeballs.

And you know, it says 750 milligrams.

So are you this, and I'm not trying to know, and this is why, this is why it makes it

a little bit more complex to like have other people help because like the way that I create

in the, in the line, like, it's very meticulous.

So it's time consuming and it's very like if you don't pack this enough, this will be 650.

You get what I'm saying?

Like, it's a very, like, that's why I'm, I'm very anal about, you know, certain things

are like my wife helps that I have her, you know, doing certain things and even then

I'm like, you ain't put the bacon in there, right?

You didn't, you didn't, like, you know, it's a little stuff because like, I, it's the reputation

of like, you know, if I'm making a claim that this is pure, then it has to be pure.

If I'm making a claim that it's this mountain, it has to be this, you know, like, I can't

falsify my, my, my thing, but like if it's, if somebody else is doing it and they don't

necessarily care on the same aspects that I care, I risk losing reputable quality product,

you know, like, so it's a very tricky balance.

So like, yeah, getting him the help with like, it wouldn't be with stuff like capsule

boutings, or like things like that.

It had to be like production, the labor side and get the muscles up boy, I get the muscle

up.

That's right.

That's right.

That's right.

Talk this box.

Let's go.

No, we got to get it.

Throw these thin blocks out there.

Don't shake these.

No one built.

Like, yeah.

No, that's awesome though, because that's, I mean, there, there's something to be said about,

you know, shipping and handling and packing and, I mean, it makes sense.

It makes complete sense.

And, you know, most, you know, if you look back, there's a lot of companies out there that

started as family franchises, you know, I call it the family franchise, it's basically

mom, dad and kid.

It gets passed on, which is, is a phenomenal feat, especially to keep that going forth.

This is not an easy task.

I mean, family farms are being crushed, you know, all across the country.

And the fact that you could do what you're doing in a two car garage, essentially, is,

you know, is pretty amazing.

And we, you know, I think, I recognize it, I value that.

I think more and more people now, and I think you're seeing this too, is that more and

more people now are valuing that kind of aspect, that nature, that natural and that vegan,

you know, you do a lot of vegan stuff.

And so I think people really want that now.

Are you seeing your clientele increase?

You know, are you getting a lot of that because of this new push?

Yeah, like, it's like, from, let's say, so I've been doing markets since 2023.

And it's like, it's been on a constant growth each year.

Like, you just see more and more people about the numbers and by the visual appearance of

it.

Like, you see so many, so many more, so much more people, so many more, however, so many

more people come and ask, you know, more questions about the mushrooms and be like, hey,

I've seen this year, and hey, I've seen this there.

So you have a lot of other people that are utilizing it, that are, you know, influencer-type

people that are, you know, pushing to a further audience.

And then, like, that's definitely helping people realize, like, oh, mushrooms are actually

cool.

Oh, mushrooms actually have benefits, and not just toxic and poison, like, we were,

we're going to make you trip, you know, like all the same typical assumptions that everybody

has from initial idea of mushroom.

Yeah.

The stereotypical mushroom thing.

Yeah.

Well, that's, that's kind of, you know, you mentioned that the guy that, that was a fellow

mushroom farmer was a men and a night, well, but like I said, the omniscient, the men

and I'd say they just love their mushrooms, which I think it's very normal.

It is.

It is.

But, you know, for respect for an understanding with earth is like really beautiful.

Exactly.

They do.

And I think too, when we're talking about medicinal means and how you are measuring out,

you know, this, is there a way, like, do you do some analysis where you can say, okay,

the, the content of, you know, whatever, whatever chemical that is really great for

a lion's mane is in your product or is it working on, I'm working on being able to get

everything lab tested right now.

It's always just been from user, user review pretty much, just you, you try it and you understand

of, whoa, like you can actually notice the benefits, like it's not like a placebo kind

of effect.

Now, once I do have my lab results to show the Horesium and the levels of, you know, all

of those medicinal properties, the beta glucans, the polysensualized, the tri-chirpins,

then I can really talk myself, you know, like, well, I'm, I'm going to be yelling.

I, you can't shut me up, but right now I'm pretty humbled because it's like I have to

be.

No, I mean, I think there's a place for everything, honestly, I really do think there's

a place for everything.

And I think you're doing a great job, I really admire what you're doing.

And I think more and more people nowadays are, like I said, they're going for the, that

particular aspect, they're going for that natural aspect, they want to see these things,

they heard these things work, they know, they're, they're much more learning, I think,

that people are more researched and more learning nowadays.

And they kind of, they trust, they trust me a little more because it's like, even things

like Amazon, that's like, you're just going to kind of create all, like you need a pound

of the lion's main powder for five dollars, you know, kind of or deals.

And a lot of those are known to have fillers and additives and just by human response,

you can tell what has additives in its pure versus like what's pure.

So like as far as lion's man, like, lion's man really, really like throw your cognitive

functions in overdrive.

It's really crazy.

And you can tell the difference if like somebody gave you some fluff or somebody gave you

some good lions, man.

So it's a very interesting dynamic, I mean, yeah, now do you, do you, um, wholesale to like

local, not, you know, what do you call those like natural stores and so I'm working on

it.

I'm, we're currently like kind of not transitioning, but adding more B2B wholesale and white label

and options out there.

So we're about to actually do a bulk reach out to try to get it into more locations.

So like I'm in this location, call sunset market in Galveston, like things like small,

smaller, you know, locals and things like that.

So that's kind of where we're trying to aim to kind of keep it.

So the, the independence and the, you know, the local people can easy, have easier access

to it.

No, that's awesome.

And that's important to you because that those little mom and, like I call the mom and

pop shops, they, you know, they have rapport.

They have trust and, and they really are the ones that want to, um, help the local community

and, and, and green the local community.

So speaking of that's, that's how they, that's how they stay, um, solvent in the world.

Exactly.

And I love that too.

I mean, I, I love the farmer's markets.

I've been, when I first moved down here, 20 some odd years ago, almost 30 years ago.

That was my big complaint because from where I'm from, we had farmer's markets everywhere,

you know, and I was dirty for crying out loud.

So the farmer's markets and texas didn't really kind of turn me for a loop.

But now it's awesome.

And my, my husband and I kind of hit almost every farmer's market we could find.

You know that because you see us.

And we really do try to, um, buy local to keep it local and really to, to, you know, give

a hand up to people in our community to get these really unique items in the marketplace

and keep them in the marketplace and keep these people in our community because really

at the end of the day, that's what makes the world go around as your relationships with

others in, in, in the community, really.

Yeah.

You're a global, right?

You've been here forever.

You've, you've grew up in this area and, you know, this is kind of one of those things

that for many people, you know, you want to improve the, the world you live in.

Exactly.

And just that's kind of what kind of push me into the nature aspect of this area because

like, yeah, I, I know the pine woods, you know, like I've grown up around this, this area

with the oak trees and the pines and all of this.

And it was more of just like, I've grown around this for 30 years, yet I've never even understood,

you know, what this little blade of grass was or what this mushroom was in front of me.

Or, you know, like, what are we doing to the ecosystem?

How's the mycelium being affected?

How the trees being affected and the kind of just spark the whole curiosity to like,

really care about the coastal region, you know, just like, yes, that's my region.

I'm more connected to this region.

I've lived in like Reno and you know, stuff like that.

Like, this is where I, you know, born and raised, passed it in a tight vibe.

Like, this is my, my area for sure.

Yeah, that is phenomenal.

We, we have a great community here.

We are so excited to, to see you every time we're at the finest market.

So if someone's looking for you, how do they find you, Mr. Kevin Jackson, Jr.

Yes, so you can go to my link tree, link tree slash roots and right, so that pretty much has all the links to everything that you need for me as all the social media links as products available online as the farmers market schedules, which is updated monthly.

So like tomorrow was sad, whatever, this weekend of April, that is scheduled as posted, that's scheduled as posted.

You go to L.I.NKTR.EE, link tree slash roots and rhizal and that's everything to get a contact you get product or everything.

That's awesome.

See, you're way much savvy than I am.

That's so fun, Kevin.

I'm so appreciative for you to be on my show and I just know people are going to be flocking to see what you have.

And hopefully we'll see you around at the, at the markets.

Thank you so much.

Of course, I was a vibe.

I appreciate you.

Yes, sir.

Everyone have a wonderful week.

We'll see you next week.

Thank you.