|
yogibike
Student

Registered: 03/31/18
Posts: 32
Loc: Hot desert climate
|
If I build it, will they come?
#28716528 - 03/27/24 06:14 PM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
In 2018, I posted photos of my agar plates on Shroomery, with questions. Nobody ever replied, so I'm guessing I must have posted in the wrong place or asked in a stupid way. I have some mild cognitive impairment, which is a reason I'm trying to grow in the first place.
I've realized that I need to figure out how to take better photos. If I do, and I post photos here, will someone reply? I have 20 of 60mm plates with MEA that I poured a month ago. On 3/6, I inoculated them variously with spores from 8 types of mushroom, and I'd like to assess them before I put any to the 9 quart jars of oats that I prepped last night. My #1 priority is to grow out a sclerotia-forming strain of Psilocybe, of which I bought syringes of four strains in 2/2024. (I know, I shouldn't have bought so many.) My #2 priority is to grow natalensis. I have these and some others on agar now, but I may have let them go too long already. Some of them definitely have contams, such as a ring of red near the rim. Others -- the brownish color might just be metabolites that sclerotia-forming strains produce.
Has someone produced a game on how to identify contams? If not, maybe I can. I screw up a lot, but I've always liked programming (especially application programming) because, compared to most things, errors can be less time-consuming and expensive.
I've read many threads here on how to recognize contams, but just like recognizing wild mushrooms, it's hard to be confident in my assessment without confirmation.
So, shall I post the photos, state what I think is happening (based on all that I've read here over the years), and then hopefully have someone confirm or correct me -- please? Thank you so much!
-------------------- 2024 grow log
|
MrSturgill
I'm a damn genuis! Just ask me




Registered: 08/31/15
Posts: 955
Loc: Somewhere over the rainbow
Last seen: 3 days, 17 hours
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: yogibike]
#28716559 - 03/27/24 06:42 PM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
Yeah people will respond
-------------------- All You Need and The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Shroomery
Read, read, read some more, don't consider anything has been read until everything has been read, then go back and read it again.
|
fnulnu
Student



Registered: 12/20/23
Posts: 359
Loc: terrapin station, in the shado...
Last seen: 3 minutes, 50 seconds
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: MrSturgill]
#28716620 - 03/27/24 07:16 PM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
Dabsolutely I Also have cognitive impairments...this shit is super easy! If you have any questions, ask, I'll try to help or help you find the answer...but I know everything!
-------------------- https://www.shroomery.org/forums/showflat.php/Number/28645465 A noob that would sure love some constructive criticism ..I have a learning difficulty, but I think I got this!
|
yogibike
Student

Registered: 03/31/18
Posts: 32
Loc: Hot desert climate
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: fnulnu]
#28716633 - 03/27/24 07:21 PM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
Thank you so much! I will take new photos after I go for a walk to clear my head.
|
yogibike
Student

Registered: 03/31/18
Posts: 32
Loc: Hot desert climate
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: yogibike]
#28716948 - 03/27/24 11:09 PM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
I tried to take good photos, but I could not get any of the top surface of the plates, due to condensation. I probably can't get that out until Sunday, the next day I can take over the bathroom & get laminar flow, due to condensation. I think condensation is my worst enemy right now. And it's not even super cold nor damp here. I'm in a hot desert place.
If I could set up light from below, would that help? Or, maybe with a manual-focus camera, I could focus on the plate's top surface and ignore most of the condensation.
Tomorrow, I will do a full writeup of how I got to this point, everything I did to prevent this condensation from happening. Regarding that, I followed all the advice I found, as far as I remembered -- including getting the agar to the ideal pouring temperature using a thermostatically-controlled water bath, pouring stacks of ten, and putting a hot jar of water on top of the stack to drive out the condensation before sealing the plates up.
I did put them into Ziploc sandwich bags this time, 2 each. I own Parafilm and used in in 2018, and I don't remember such condensation then. This time, I followed a TEK that said that Ziploc bags breathe a little, and I trusted that...
I think I got the right proportions of agar/DME/water. I followed the recipe in the TEK, which was from a successful grower whose genetics have won awards for psilocybin levels. I'll post full details tomorrow.
I'm generally good at baking and other processes that are intolerant of errors, so I'm befuddled.
For now, the only photos I got that seem worth showing are the ones of the bottoms of the petri dishes. I numbered them 1 through 8, but I'm most interested in 1-4 (various sclerotia-forming Psilocybes) and #8 (P. natalensis). The full list (from commercial spore syringes unless otherwise indicated) is: 1. P. ATL#7 Galindoi (2 plates) 2. P. T. Tampensis (2 plates) 3. P. Mexicana Jalisco (2 plates) 4. P. Mexicana A (2 plates) 5. Morchella importuna (landscape black morel, 2 plates) 6. Pleurotus citrinopileatus (yellow oyster, 2 plates) 7. Lentinula edodes (shitake, 2 plates) 8. P. natalensis (6 plates from spore print)
In many of these plates, I got more than the one drop I wanted. It's hard for me to control the syringe's plunger precisely. "When it rains, it pours," feels apt. Next time maybe I squirt onto an inoc loop?
I see red around the edge of 2-3 plates and I assume that's contam, perhaps lipstick mold? I read in a thread here that it "is associated with either Geotrichum sp., G. candidum, Sporendonema sp. or S. purpurascens."
From the top, I see some fluffy & some webby mycelium but it's white, not gray, so I think it's not cobweb? Maybe just way too many strains competing with one another, due to my accidentally dispensing way too much liquid from the spore syringe?
Generally, dark stuff is bad, but browns and grays may appear in sclerotia-bearing strains. If it's white, rhizomorphic growth is better, but that's not to be expected from multispore; rhizomorphic growth would develop from an isolated strain after one or more transfers from this point.
The morel plates actually looked like they had tiny morel mushroom fruits, especially near the edge, from pretty early on. It was kinda fun to see a strain that was so eager to fruit.
I'm trying to decide:
1. Can I put any of strains 1-8 to oats on Sunday or (if you think it can't wait that long) maybe sooner if either (a) revert to my still air box, which I'd use in our kitchen, which is hard to clean due to knicknacks & such; or (b) I rent a motel room for myself or my girlfriend. (The issue is just that I can't take over the bathroom while she's home. It's where I've been running my small homemade laminar flow box.)
2. Can I put any of 1-4 or 8 to oats directly, or should I transfer to fresh agar and try to isolate a strain? I've read that this will generally give me better yield, presumably due to not having to waste energy competing with "cousin" strains. However, there's a time limit here: Daytime highs can be 115 degrees Fahrenheit here in the summer, if our power goes out, which it typically does during the summer, for at least 24 hours.
I'm probably forgetting something crucial, not just in my cultivation efforts but in this writeup. Is that I've written, plus these photos, useful at all? If so, please reply. Otherwise, wait for me to type up all my notes tomorrow.
Thank you!












Edited by yogibike (04/01/24 10:35 AM)
|
yogibike
Student

Registered: 03/31/18
Posts: 32
Loc: Hot desert climate
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: yogibike]
#28716953 - 03/27/24 11:24 PM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
P.S. Regarding the time limit until summer: Here, "summer" can begin in April. And certainly by June it can be 30 degrees above the ideal temps for growing any of these mushrooms.
|
IamBrick

Registered: 08/08/23
Posts: 248
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: yogibike]
#28716954 - 03/27/24 11:24 PM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
I'll be honest with you on 2 things.
1. We can't see shit through those plates in that state, use a cup of hot water set on top of the plates to break up the condensation or like you suggested wait until you can open them under flow.
2. Does it really matter what the contam is? contam is contam. Take clean transfers away from those plates to clean up the cultures.
Also helpful tip for inoculating plates with a syringe, squeeze the sides of the syringe instead of using the plunger. The tube has enough give to push out a single drop, flooding plates with LC or spores makes it really difficult to get clean transfers and/or see if source inoculant is clean sometimes.
|
FlashBang
Stranger
Registered: 02/16/24
Posts: 45
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: IamBrick]
#28716984 - 03/28/24 12:09 AM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
There are several contamination guides. This is just what google has in the first replies. They are definetly lacking in a lot of ways. I would like to see one that shows multiple high quality images including on aga plates and under a microscope. I would like to see references to comonality and which substrates and methods are more prone. Links to wikipedia articles on the species is a requirement. Some of these guides have some of this. I'm not aware of a master list, or one that is very well done. I end up googling and reading wikipedia. "Shroomery cultivation field guide to competing organisms." would be a good title. It could even just be a long post that gets updated. Maybe its been done or even a few times and I've missed it. dunno.
North Spore
another
another
-------------------- "If you want to experiment do so at your own peril or joy but please do not assume that you are going to discover a new ground-breaking way of doing things." -Hitchhikers guide. "Don't mind if I do." -FlashBang
|
MrSturgill
I'm a damn genuis! Just ask me




Registered: 08/31/15
Posts: 955
Loc: Somewhere over the rainbow
Last seen: 3 days, 17 hours
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: FlashBang]
#28716994 - 03/28/24 12:27 AM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
Info Info Info There's tons of information out there, just have to look and read for days. Mushroom cultivation isn't terribly complicated, spores to agar, make clean plates, make clean spawn, grow mushrooms in controlled environment. Follow well known trusted teks to develop your skills and you will succeed.
-------------------- All You Need and The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Shroomery
Read, read, read some more, don't consider anything has been read until everything has been read, then go back and read it again.
|
DERRAYLD
Constructus


Registered: 05/13/02
Posts: 10,512
Loc: South Africa
Last seen: 6 minutes, 3 seconds
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: MrSturgill]
#28716995 - 03/28/24 12:30 AM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|

All the resources are available on the shroomery.
@yogibike, no one can identify a thing from the back of the plate but I can say they look to be fully colonized which will make identification even more difficult.
|
yogibike
Student

Registered: 03/31/18
Posts: 32
Loc: Hot desert climate
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: IamBrick]
#28717229 - 03/28/24 08:49 AM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
This helps. The cup of hot water on top, will that work while the plates are still in their plastic bags? Like I said, I get access to laminar flow only about one day a week, tops.
Would you blame the plastic bags for the condensation? Presumably the agar loses some moisture eventually and the Parafilm would have let it escape faster than the plastic bags did.
Even when I didn't have condensation (see my 2018 photos) the photos weren't any good. Neither are my eyes, for that matter. I've read threads on photographing agar plates. I implemented what I was able, as far as I understood. (Like "light from 45 degrees off." 45 degrees with respect to what, in 3D space? I'd need at least *two* angles and a definition of the coordinate system. None of the threads I found had diagrams, leaving me to try to visualize, which I struggle with.)
It's pretty humbling to hear you say that it's simple if you just follow directions. Over the years (it's been six years since my last, discouraging attempt) I've read so many TEKs on here from Trusted Cultivators (Bod, c10, RR, etc., and bought & watched RR's videos) and followed all advice that I remembered. Obviously I must have done *something* wrong, if contamination is impossible when one does the right things.
|
yogibike
Student

Registered: 03/31/18
Posts: 32
Loc: Hot desert climate
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: yogibike]
#28717253 - 03/28/24 09:08 AM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
I'm going to ask for some more people to reply. I have received answers like "contam is contam," but one of my goals is to test my ability to identify contam based on the fact that I *have* already been reading tons of threads on here for years.
I'm not even sure the strains #1-4 are contaminated at all. You can't rule out contam, because you can't see the top. But can you say that they do have contam, from the bottom? If that's the case, I don't need to photograph the top because I can throw them away.
I know full well there's infinite amounts of info on here. Some of it, um... For instance, I followed Bod's tek for oat prep (as I had for MEA prep) and it says the boiled oats will stem themselves dry in 2 hours in a colander. Mine didn't, and I'm in a very dry place. After waiting a while longer than 2 hours for that to happen as the TEK suggested it would, I ended up spending many hours drying the oats on baking sheets, on towels, and with a fan.
Could it be something like, all the best TEKs only *reduce* the odds of contam and the particle count by some constant factor at each step, but if the particle count in my house is 100x higher to begin with, the contam rate at some steps could be 100x higher than yours? We live in a shitty little rental house. Six years ago, my girlfriend told the landlord that the evaporative cooler leaks water constantly. She ignored that for years. Eventually, last summer, the ceiling caved in, in two rooms, including the bathroom where I set up laminar flow (which has a creepy 1/2" gap between the sink and the wall, which we can't clean). These ceilings were replaced. But presumably the entire attic (wooden rafters, sheathing, etc.) is well-colonized with mold and possibly the walls too. The whole neighborhood is full of neglected properties like this, rotting sheds, rotting wood from unfinished projects, etc.
Edited by yogibike (03/28/24 09:20 AM)
|
yogibike
Student

Registered: 03/31/18
Posts: 32
Loc: Hot desert climate
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: yogibike]
#28717311 - 03/28/24 09:40 AM (2 months, 30 days ago) |
|
|
Meanwhile, should I probably give away my prepped oat jars, on the premise that by the time I get agar good enough to inoculate them, and time to do so (working only on Sundays), they will probably have dried out (again, I'm in a hot desert) or contam'd?
Edited by yogibike (04/01/24 10:36 AM)
|
yogibike
Student

Registered: 03/31/18
Posts: 32
Loc: Hot desert climate
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: yogibike]
#28717334 - 03/28/24 10:00 AM (2 months, 29 days ago) |
|
|
I think that what I would find most encouraging at this point would be for someone to say "I faithfully followed TEKs from trusted cultivators several times before I got anything good enough to use. It's a numbers game. Just keep at it. You clearly had to read & follow a lot of TEKs just to get where you got already."
Also I'd like to hear, "don't use Ziploc bags. They don't work as well as Parafilm for letting water vapor escape" -- rather than stand by a few TCs who have said that Ziploc bags can be used. (The great thing about experts is there are so many to choose from /s)
There's got to be a lot of survivorship bias in this, right? By that I mean that, with some exceptions, anyone who hasn't quit the hobby already has found it "easy if one only follows directions," and vice versa.
Any step we take to achieve a sterile field only reduces contams by a constant factor, right?
|
normalperson
Stranger


Registered: 10/31/19
Posts: 768
Last seen: 19 days, 12 hours
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: yogibike]
#28717429 - 03/28/24 11:23 AM (2 months, 29 days ago) |
|
|
"homemade laminar flow box"......? Please tell us more about that, and post a picture of it. how bad is your eyesight? Have you tried using a magnifying glass to view your plates? also, FYI, a SAB works great in the dirtiest locations. you just have to KEEP THE AIR STILL IN THE BOX for it to work correctly. You do not have to clean the kitchen to use the STILL AIR BOX in the kitchen, just make sure there is nothing actively moving the air around in the room. close doors and windows and shut any hvac vents. wait 30 minutes and then get to work.
|
alienascii
Gone


Registered: 05/10/09
Posts: 28
Last seen: 2 months, 25 days
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: normalperson]
#28717555 - 03/28/24 01:08 PM (2 months, 29 days ago) |
|
|
Quote:
normalperson said: "homemade laminar flow box"......? Please tell us more about that, and post a picture of it.
Answer correctly, about 15 people waiting to pounce
|
CaptainPuffy
Marbles Lost


Registered: 06/08/11
Posts: 150
Last seen: 1 day, 15 hours
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: yogibike]
#28717574 - 03/28/24 01:20 PM (2 months, 29 days ago) |
|
|
Quote:
yogibike said: Any step we take to achieve a sterile field only reduces contams by a constant factor, right?
It depends on what stage you're on. An unopened grain jar that was properly hydrated and sterilized should stay sterile indefinitely.
If you open that jar for a short period of time in a properly set up SAB or infront of a functioning flow hood, the jar will likely remain sterile. Any contaminations will likely have come from user failure.
Coir on the other hand is not sterile. It's also non-nutritous. This means that contams don't have enough energy to complete their life cycle. The primary vector for coir to become contaminated is from spawn created with dirty inoculant or with improper technique.
With coir, the only race that happens is if you use dirty spawn. Then it's a race to see if the spawn can fruit before the mold uses the energy from the dirty spawn to claim some or all of the coir.
|
fnulnu
Student



Registered: 12/20/23
Posts: 359
Loc: terrapin station, in the shado...
Last seen: 3 minutes, 50 seconds
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: CaptainPuffy]
#28717632 - 03/28/24 02:17 PM (2 months, 29 days ago) |
|
|
"I faithfully followed TEKs from trusted cultivators several times before I got anything good enough to use. It's a numbers game. Just keep at it. You clearly had to read & follow a lot of TEKs just to get where you got already."
But seriously, I tried bods agar tek on 1/1, the first time failed, I went and bought some actual petri dishes and took my time, and succeeded. I did agar to grain, and was some success and a few not...but super slow. I read more. Grain to grain was almost all success (this is in a SAB, and bending down like that SUCKS with a bad back). Did josex 'poke' liquid culture tek in a SAB almost a month ago, then got a ffu and inoculated a few daze ago, and shit looks really grate!
-------------------- https://www.shroomery.org/forums/showflat.php/Number/28645465 A noob that would sure love some constructive criticism ..I have a learning difficulty, but I think I got this!
|
yogibike
Student

Registered: 03/31/18
Posts: 32
Loc: Hot desert climate
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: alienascii]
#28719069 - 03/29/24 11:21 AM (2 months, 28 days ago) |
|
|
I was asked which laminar flood hood I built. I guess here you'd call it a FFU. GordoTEK, who owns a real laminar flow hood and a particle counter, published, for the frugal, a sub-$100, small, FFU on YouTube and Patreon, and I built one. I realize this is not ideal but I wanted to try because I hated trying to see through the cloudy plastic of my SAB (I'm claustrophobic and my vision is bad to begin with) and because at this time I cannot justify spending more than I did on this. It was either this or give up.
(Or I could use *just a Bunsen burner* [in lieu of SAB or laminar flow hood] to create an updraft in which to do sterile techniques. This is the method taught by the local guy who teaches nearly all of the local classes on mushroom cultivation. He was taught this while getting his PhD in microbiology. In his program, they used this method for all their labs. He's used it for 25 years. He doesn't understand why anyone messes with laminar flow hoods or SABs. But if his bunsen burner method is so great, I don't understand why I don't see anyone online using it. Is the mycology hobby (and the business) so dominated by "personality cults" and "cargo cults" that it has settled firmly on suboptimal methods, or is this local guy potentially a liar who teaches this method in order to sabotage his potential local competition? In his classes, in evenings in large public meeting rooms, we spray 70% isopropyl alcohol on our hands & forearms but don't wear masks, hair nets, beard nets, etc., and I don't remember wearing gloves there. The agar plates I inoculated in his classes and wrapped in Parafilm there have stayed clean, but in subsequent steps I've failed to get a harvest.)
After building the FFU from GordoTEK's design, on 2/26 2/25 I used it to pour MEA into 20 of 60mm plates. Then I incubated them at 80 degrees Fahrenheit until 8 9 days later, 3/6, when I was ready to inoculate them. At this point, I saw no contams in them yet. I count this as a win, a contam rate lower than I had in a veteran grower's SAB under his direct supervision (see below), but that could be luck. (This hobby has got to be rife with survivorship bias, right?)
(Contam appeared in my plates only after 3/6, when I inoculated them, #1-7 with commercial spore syringes from a Shroomery sponsor and then #8 from GordoTEK's natalensis print. I do realize it may have been just a matter of time, and, especially since the vendor is one of the oldest sponsors of Shroomery, then folks should blame GordoTEK or me for the contam -- except that we know that most spore prints and spore syringes are not made under sterile conditions; nobody claims they are.)
@GordoTEK is on Shroomery but is not designated as a Trusted Cultivator here. I found him on YouTube and then joined his Patreon, which has no paywalls, but I wanted to send him $2/month. He sent me spore prints for free, of his Pan. cyanescens (TTBVI), which has won awards for psilocybin content, and also P. natalensis.
The number of users of GordoTEK's (pseudo?) laminar flow hood design is probably small compared to the laminar flow hood TEKs by TCs on Shroomery. I think his/mine smaller than the others. Certainly I've found it hard to stay within the "sweet spot" of (pseudo?) laminar flow of this small box. Additionally, the box I built may have flaws in my own workmanship, such as leaks. The adjustable-speed fan can reach 800CFM but with this small filter it has to be run slower to prevent (reduce?) turbulence. I calibrated the fan speed, to minimize turbulence, using first a flame and then smoke. The fan could support a larger filter if I want to build a larger cabinet someday, but for now, I don't have space for a bigger one.
Based on responses here, I think I will go back to using a Still Air Box in my kitchen. (But can I put my Presto 23qt PC in it to cool? I guess people don't do that, huh? Maybe I will build a larger SAB using actual glass that I can see through better than cloudy plastic.) Although, as I DM'd one of you, and as I think may be worth repeating here, and as I wish that people would admit more readily to noobs like me, so that we can mentally prepare ourselves for outcomes (although would this discourage some of us?) :
1. In 2018, a local guy who'd been growing loads of shrooms for years gave a hands-on tutorial to me and a few others how to grow at his home, in his SAB, with his spore print, with a spore syringe he made from it right in front of me, with PF TEK jars he'd prepped himself. He provided 3 jars and I inoculated them under his supervision, and he said I did it right. And even so, 2 of those 3 jars ended up contam'd. (The 3rd jar, which I gave back to him due to personal circumstances, he said grew more shrooms than he'd seen from any one jar. What I did was to keep it in my car trunk, in [a hot desert climate in the Northern Hemisphere], March to late May, sandwiched between two bags of gravel for thermal mass to moderate between day & night temperatures -- because my landlord had made me promise not to grow on his property.) So I have to imagine that possibly, even for some veteran growers, 2/3 of well-executed grows may contam. I can't ask him because he died soon after that. (RIP, Paul, my "teddy bear shaman" [the kind of person who put me at ease & I wanted to hug]; I still have the spore print that you mailed me while I was away.)
2. No filter claims to remove all particles below a certain size. It claims to remove a percentage of them. (Presumably, manufacturing leaves each one with a few tiny holes.) If, in my house, the filter's input has 100x more particles than in your house, then so will the filter's output; and if so, my rate of contams could be 100x more, even if I follow TEKs as faithfully as you do. I might have to start over 100 times. If I do, even though this is probably due to the noob's error, that isn't necessarily so. This is an perspective that I wish I'd read in 2018, because it would have encouraged me to keep trying indefinitely rather than try once or twice more and then wait over 5 years. I've invested well over $800 into this (tools, spores, materials, classes, and lost wages from days of per-diem work that I skipped to attempt this) but doing 100 attempts would not have cost 100x that. And thanks to giving up, I've lost over 100x that amount, *each year*, due to cognitive impairment that kept me from my career and perhaps might have been treated by what I could have grown.
Edited by yogibike (04/01/24 10:37 AM)
|
yogibike
Student

Registered: 03/31/18
Posts: 32
Loc: Hot desert climate
|
Re: If I build it, will they come? [Re: yogibike]
#28720309 - 03/30/24 02:21 PM (2 months, 27 days ago) |
|
|
Thanks again to all who've replied!
I haven't taken any photos of the tops yet, awaiting a sterile workspace in which to open their baggies. A week or so ago, I'd shaken all the water out of the Petri dishes (into one edge of the bag), but it's already gone back into them again. I'll work in the SAB in my kitchen tomorrow.
I'm thinking that if I use a SAB much, I should wrap a camera in a Ziploc bag to use inside the SAB. (I've heard that cell phones are filthy.) I'm tempted to install a webcam inside the SAB. I'm guessing someone has tried that but it's a bad idea because you want to be able to spray everything down in there? Would def read up on this before moving toward it.
One thing that I may have neglected to do in my own SAB in 2018-19 was to soak a towel with bleach water, put that in the bottom, and work on a wire rack an inch or two above that, as c10 mentions in their agar TEK. I am hopeful that this will help. (I am not sure these aspects were mentioned to me by my original local teachers, and I, thinking I knew how to use a SAB, may not have read much more about SAB technique once I joined Shroomery.)
My alcohol burner, as shipped from Amazon, has made only a yellow flame and I am not sure that it got my needles or inoculating loop red-hot -- possibly a dull red but def not bright red. That could be part of the problem with the spore print, although for the syringes, all needles were sterile for this, their first use.
If my oats will keep a while (I still have foil over them to slow their drying out) I think I'll aim to transfer agar to agar, for strain isolation, for eventually higher yield. Haste makes waste, but the main tradeoff is that eventually (by June) it will be 115degF here and the power will fail for 24 to 72 hours sometime this summer. I have a certain number of coolers and can buy bags of ice, though there'll be a run on it. I may be able to keep jars of sclerotia cool (I could perhaps even bury them!), but fruiting chambers I may have a harder time keeping cool.
|
|