Jeff Chilton, raised in Pacific Northwest, studied Ethno-mycology at the University of Washington  in the late sixties. In 1973 he started work on a commercial mushroom farm in Olympia,  Washington. During the next 10 years he became the production manager, responsible for the  cultivation of over 2 million pounds of agaricus mushrooms per year. He was also involved in the  research and development of shiitake, oyster and enoki mushrooms which resulted in the earliest  US fresh shiitake sales in 1978.  

In the late seventies he was a co-founder of Mycomedia, which held 4 mushroom conferences in  the Pacific Northwest. These educational conferences brought together educators and experts in  mushroom identification, ethno-mycology, and mushroom cultivation.

In the 1980’s he operated a mushroom spawn business and in 1989 he started Nammex, a  business that introduced medicinal mushrooms to the US nutritional supplement industry. He  traveled extensively in China during the 1990’s, attending conferences and visiting research  facilities and mushroom farms. In 1997 he organized the first organic certification workshop for  mushroom production in China. 

Jeff co authored the highly acclaimed book, The Mushroom Cultivator, which was published in 1983.