Cut 'em open and pour them in a jar with a tight seal. When you need a pack, microwave hell out of some and rubber band them into a piece of coffee filter.
The colored beads indicate how water saturated they are. When they’re nuked and dried out, they change color. YMMV as some manufacturers use different colors or none at all. Whatever. Nuke 'em and reuse.
It’s an exciting hobby.
I also like to collect snacks!
Here’s a hot tip: get some DIY tea bags for a few bucks on Amazon (or your preferred cheap tat bazaar)…
I make my own dessicsnt packs for use with 3d printer filament spools when I store them, and the tea bags are a godsend.
Why does it look hella moist inside that jar? Isn’t that the shit that absorbs moisture? Or is this actually the stuff that absorbs O2 (and not the dissicant)? 🤔
Op says s/he heats them when they need them. These are standard silica gel beads, dehydrating them makes them usable again. They are not the iron oxygen absorbers.
I find putting them into a baking tray and baking them or air frying them at the lowest setting for an hour or two gets them dried out much more than the microwave method.
A nice quick snack 😋
I should do something similar. I buy a lot of electronics and 3d print filament, and I get a bag with every item. I started collecting them, because I often need some, but now I have a bucket full.
Just an FYI if you encounter any with the blue/pink moisture indicator beads rather than this orange/green kind, I wouldn’t put those near anything you intend to eat out of.
The cobalt chloride indicator is somewhat poisonous.
Good to know. I use the blue/pink ones for 3D printer stuff and I have cats. Fortunately they haven’t expressed any interest in the ones I’ve dropped.
Pretty sure the orange/green ones aren’t any better…
As a rather dull man I find it quite exciting! I actually live in a very humid place, last year I lost massive massive amounts of aspen oyster mushrooms I dried thoroughly dried and packed in plastic ziplocks, many with 2 ziplocks, they all went bad. Like 40 pounds dried I kid you not, a week of foraging during the solstice (their big flush here,) all ruined.
I have other problems, heating with wood, condensation and humidity mildews clothes, especially if I leave for work for days at a time.
I was wondering if there is some cheap thing I could use for dessicant going forward? I don’t buy new shit that has silica in it often so that’s not an option.
Activated charcoal and a dehumidifier
After months of lemmy lurking, this is the comment that broke my heart enough to join. Sorry for your loss. Ziploc bags are terrible for long term food preservation.
I don’t forage mushrooms but buy them from a local grower then dehydrated them and store them in mason or wire bail gasketed jars. This works fine, they last as long as you would expect dehydrated food to last (1 to 3 years if you observe food storage rules, longer if you allow sight/smell/texture breakdown to guide you).
Light exposure is important as well, keep them away from direct light or in the dark (a cabinet) as much as possible.
I’m more of the “how did our ancestors handle feeding their families before modern conveniences” camp but there are the “throw a bunch of money at things labelled ‘prepping’ and hoard all the things we don’t eat in a normal day” camp.
Things I’ve seen people do in the latter to extend how long they retain quality is adding oxygen absorbers (different from silica) to the following:
- vacuum seal in mason jars with a special jar attachment,
- vacuum seal in vacuum sealing-specific clear plastic with a special machine,
- (vacuum seal?) in mylar bags.
These are a bit overkill and definitely beyond your “cheap” request. Having 10 years of dried mushrooms would be… unappetising and detrimental to storage economy.
Plus you risk killing off local communities and depriving other foragers for the year when you don’t follow the 10% rule (don’t take more than 10% of what you see from a location).
I forage, just not mushrooms or from the carrot family. Knowing how and where to find something with a stash to keep you two years in case of a bad harvest is all you need.
Thank you for the information, it is much appreciated and I will record it for further reference.
I do follow wildcrafting guidelines generally, never take more than a third of a stand if it’s at all threatened or slow growing, and leave some of the healthiest looking ones.
But that’s not the case with these mushrooms. First of all, I live in nowhere, national and state forest everywhere, and a handful of hicks and others that live there. The woods is vast, beyond vast, there are almost no people that go off trail as I do, let alone off their atv’s. Also, by the time mushrooms are harvestible size, they dropped most of their spores. You can also carry them in a mesh bag to let more come out.
But there is no shortage of spores, I can assure you.
You don’t have to cut them out of the old bags, y’know.
An impressive entry for sure, but on the other hand I spy a flower on your table to brighten up the room, and that’s not dull at all.
OP instantly barred from the club
Got me. That’s in a Tobacco bottle I chopped the top of for a single-flower vase. It has a hummingbird I designed, cut and frosted on, along with a hemp wrap around the top. Far too exciting for this crowd.
Wife and I are still fighting despite my insipid little gift. :(
Sounds like “receiving gifts” might not be her love language.
Have you tried Klingon?
An honourable battle will surely spice up any love life.
Maybe try giving her some of your desiccants.
ATM, let’s just say she’s plenty dry. :(
omgawd hahaha
Oof. That’s rough, buddy. I hope it all works out in the end.
🤣
Those are delicious. Do not eat is a conspiracy. THEY WANT YOU TO PAY FOR THEM.
For real though, they’re nontoxic and basically safe to eat. They say do not eat just because it isn’t food and the packets can be a choking hazard.
Stir a spoonful or two into your coffee every day and you’ll never get toenail fungus.
DOCTORS HATE THAT TRICK.
Be careful that you don’t mix in any of the oxygen absorbing packs. Those ones contain iron, which I unfortunately learned after my dog ate one. I haven’t tried microwaving them but I’m guessing that the iron filings would get pretty spicy in there.
How often do you need one?
Been awhile! I used to make my own black powder, too exciting for this gang, so I’d throw one in the jar. I’ve had other chemistry experiments I’ve used 'em for as well. Dude that separated and dried his laundry pods in this comm got me thinking about it.
What if I needed a desiccant pack and couldn’t make one?!
When you say you made your own black powder, did you make the salt petre too? I have a lot of questions, and I believe your answers could well be dull enough for this group.
They used to make salt petre, since replaced with ammonia derived explosives and fertilizers, turned into nitric acid then explosives and the like, by suspending a canvas sheet off the ground, covered from the rain, and putting manure, straw, and rancid piss on it and turning it for months. The salt petre would accumulate under the canvas.
They used to pay people for their piss, and it’s the source of the saying, so poor they don’t have a pot to piss in.
Anyway it’s like 80% of black powder if I recall, most of the rest sulphur, and a bit of charcoal, that is the actual fuel. The salt petre provides a kind of stored oxygen for the reactio as I understand it, and sulphur makes it happen.
Now I know what you are going to say, they used bat guano to make it, much from chile, and that’s true, it was easier that way then the more traditional way but they were running out and the industrialists put a bounty on making something like ammonia.
A frenchman almost did it passing steam over burning charcoal, in an open environment or something and horribly disfigured himself. Then some german figured to in a closed environment to pass steam and air under great pressure in the presence of a catalyst like platinum, or something like that.
Relatively often if you do 3D printing.
You can use them if you 3d print to dry filament, well not to dry but to keep them dry.
I get to post Brown Jacket Man three times in a week? This is pretty much how some dehumidifiers work, but fully automated.
