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OfflineGitsum
Stranger

Registered: 10/15/18
Posts: 2
Last seen: 4 years, 8 months
Can a spore syringe be contaminated?
    #25599558 - 11/07/18 08:26 PM (6 years, 2 months ago)

Having some issues.  I’ll give you a brief background.
Ordered a grow kit (hadn’t found this website yet) and 6 syringes of spores.
First mistake is that I let the kit sit for about 2-3 months before inoculation.
Second mistake is that I didn’t clean my environment and needle well.
Result of first kit is that 75% of the jars grew all sorts of interesting things.  I ended up throwing them away.  I have 5 jars left that are almost fully colonized, but the last bit of growth has been very slow.  Hope to get them fruiting in the next week.

My next step was to purchase all the necessary supplies and prepare my own PF Tek jars.  Sterilized in pressure cooker.  Flammed needles and inoculated in an still air box.  All the jars started to show fuzzy off white growth in just a couple of days (didn’t look like the mycelium from my first round).  A few days later about 60% of the jars showed clear contamination.  The the last remaining jars started to show contamination as well.  I’m trying to review what I can do to prevent this in the future. 

Is it possible that contaminated syringe could be the culprit in my failed second attempt?

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Offline2in1
Pineapple
Male


Registered: 11/04/18
Posts: 283
Loc: England
Last seen: 6 years, 10 days
Re: Can a spore syringe be contaminated? [Re: Gitsum]
    #25599588 - 11/07/18 08:41 PM (6 years, 2 months ago)

Hi there,
  Yes your syringes can absolutely be contaminated, in fact it's almost impossible to get a sterile syringe.
Some vendors are better than others and I have a feeling the more spores per ml in the solution can help fight off latent contamination upon inoculation.

This is why it's recommended to drop your spore solution on agar plates, and then transfer to clean up the culture.

Its really painful taking multiple months to go from spore syringe to LC to grain to bulk sub, only to find that the fucking spore syringe was contaminated and have to start all over again. (Just been through this, lost 9 massive bags of hpoo with PE)
So I'm ordering some agar plates and gonna try do this the right way.
Measure twice cut once!

I recommend starting as small as possible and isolating everything so you can identify the problem.

Agar will show us what we need to know in the quickest time possible with the minimum cost.

Also I highly recommend starting with trustworthy spores, check out the vendors here but I have always had great results with sporeworks.


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Offlineteladi
FUNKSOULBROTHER


Registered: 06/27/17
Posts: 1,189
Loc: South Africa Flag
Last seen: 1 year, 5 months
Re: Can a spore syringe be contaminated? [Re: 2in1]
    #25600000 - 11/08/18 03:56 AM (6 years, 2 months ago)

Most aspects of our hobby are a compromise between convenience and cost, and the probability of contamination. While some may have luck directly inoculating a substrate - and it really does come down to luck - cleaning up their cultures with agar is an essential step for most. It is a necessary evil, that adds time, cost and steps. But, that cost is cheaper than throwing out whole tubs or batches of bags.

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OfflineHALFemptyJOSH
Magician
Male


Registered: 09/01/03
Posts: 428
Loc: USA Flag
Last seen: 6 years, 2 months
Re: Can a spore syringe be contaminated? [Re: teladi]
    #25600240 - 11/08/18 07:46 AM (6 years, 2 months ago)

Wipe down everything in bleech water or 91% isopropyl... EVERYTHING. New latex gloves.. Outside of sterile jars.. EVERYTHING.. That practice alone will get you to a 90%-95% success. And choke yourself on lysol... Hashtag worth

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OfflineTormatoMFacebookDiscordReddit
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I'm a teapot User Gallery


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Registered: 07/01/17
Posts: 6,106
Last seen: 2 days, 22 hours
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Re: Can a spore syringe be contaminated? [Re: HALFemptyJOSH]
    #25600266 - 11/08/18 08:01 AM (6 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

HALFemptyJOSH said:
Wipe down everything in bleech water or 91% isopropyl... EVERYTHING. New latex gloves.. Outside of sterile jars.. EVERYTHING.. That practice alone will get you to a 90%-95% success. And choke yourself on lysol... Hashtag worth



70% is more effective and honestly Lysol isn't going to do anything the alcohol hasn't already done :shrug:


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OfflineBloomingAlchemy
ShamanLady


Registered: 10/12/18
Posts: 155
Last seen: 5 years, 6 months
Re: Can a spore syringe be contaminated? [Re: HALFemptyJOSH]
    #25600270 - 11/08/18 08:07 AM (6 years, 2 months ago)

Yes, your spore syringes can be contaminated.

I am in the process of switching to agar because I want to start cloning, but I have had very good success with syringes for 3 years.

The contamination most likely happened due to user error and not your syringe. Firstly, your jars sat for way too long. And a SAB won't be effective if you don't take every single precaution.

My process is to turn off any vents or fans in the house, take a shower, put on clean clothes, and then I sanitize my work room as best I can. EVERYTHING gets wiped with soapy water/bleach mix, then 70% rubbing alcohol. Then I put on a respirator and fill the whole room with lysol. I have everything I could need to use in that sterile work room. Then I put on gloves,sanitize the gloves, and go to work. All my syringes sit in a bath of 70% alcohol for at least one minute before I use them on my jars. And they get dipped in alcohol between each jar.

In the last year, I have inoculated hundreds of jars and not a single one contaminated. If you get your syringes from a reputable source and follow completely sterile technique, you shouldn't have a problem. Once you get that down though, I do recommend testing cultures on agar or cloning on agar.

Hope this helped. Good luck and have fun! Starting is hard but its great once you get the ball rolling.


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Lets keep this sacred medicine alive and well! I embrace the shamans, psychonauts, and alchemists of our time :mushroom2:

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OfflineGitsum
Stranger

Registered: 10/15/18
Posts: 2
Last seen: 4 years, 8 months
Re: Can a spore syringe be contaminated? [Re: Gitsum]
    #25602887 - 11/09/18 11:29 AM (6 years, 2 months ago)

Thanks for the feedback. 
I thought I kept my environment pretty damn clean and took all precautions in my second inoculation.  My first inoculation was open air and I didn’t follow standard precautions and I still got about 30% success (it was late at night, I was tired and sloppy and just wanted to get it done).  I was very very careful in my second attempt and all the jars failed.  I think I’ll chaulk this one up to a bad syringe (also, makes me feel a little better about myself). 
This experience will push me into working with Agar as everyone has suggested.

Thanks for the feedback!

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OfflinePiaseski
Day Tripper
Registered: 11/09/15
Posts: 391
Last seen: 1 year, 1 month
Re: Can a spore syringe be contaminated? [Re: Gitsum]
    #25602900 - 11/09/18 11:36 AM (6 years, 2 months ago)

Just to add, I've always had some issues going spore syringe to agar - with it taking a while to germinate and the issue of adding water to the surface.

Recently tried making a thin layer of brf/verm in my no pour containers and it germinated in a couple of days and the growth is super easy to transfer (then to agar) as you can just lift a little with the scalpel.


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