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NWDude
Stranger
Registered: 09/12/07
Posts: 42
Last seen: 15 years, 2 months
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Meixner Test
#7486433 - 10/04/07 08:53 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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hi im reading up on the Meixner Test at mushroom expert http://www.mushroomexpert.com/meixner.html and im wondering if there is another way to test for amatoxins or ware to get ahold of some hydrochloric acid. I understand that hydrochloric acid cant just be sold to any one but there needs to be some sort of kit or stand down town that allows people to test there mushrooms.
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Alan Rockefeller
Mycologist


Registered: 03/10/07
Posts: 48,276
Last seen: 1 hour, 41 minutes
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Re: Meixner Test [Re: NWDude]
#7486554 - 10/04/07 09:26 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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> hi im reading up on the Meixner Test at mushroom expert http://www.mushroomexpert.com/meixner.html > and im wondering if there is another way to test for amatoxins
Yes, a real lab test will be more accurate than the meixner test. Some people from one of the local fungus federations tried the meixner test on every mushroom in the fungus fair and many of the deadly mushrooms showed up as safe, and many safe mushrooms showed up as deadly. Maybe they didn't use the right kind of newspaper or ran the test wrong somehow, or maybe it just sucks.
Anyone else have an opinion on this? I have a phat sack of Galerina marginata that I plan to test, but haven't gotten around to it. Its been sitting around my kitchen for awhile, people made me write poison/toxic all over the bag.
> or ware to get ahold of some hydrochloric acid. I understand that hydrochloric acid cant just be sold to any one but there needs to be some sort of kit or stand down town that allows people to test there mushrooms.
Hydrochloric is one of the most easy to obtain of the truely dangerous chemicals. Last time I bought a gallon from my local hardware store, it cost me less than a gallon of gasoline. It is sold in the pool section of every hardware store under the name Muriatic acid. Take the safety precautions seriously, if some splashes in your eye you are instantly seriously fucked, and if some gets on your skin it won't take you long to decide to wash it off.
Its not really all that bad, just a little acidic.
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ToxicMan
Bite me, it's fun!


Registered: 06/28/02
Posts: 6,722
Loc: Aurora, Colorado
Last seen: 4 hours, 53 minutes
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Re: Meixner Test [Re: NWDude]
#7486860 - 10/04/07 11:15 PM (16 years, 3 months ago) |
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There are lots of problems with the Meixner test. Although it's really sensitive, it also gives a lot of false positives.
My understanding is that a significant number of specimens of deadly, amatoxin containing mushrooms actually don't have any amatoxins in them. So you can easily find specimens that will test negative even though you have the correct ID. This isn't something that gets spread around too much, because some fool will decide that maybe they can play the odds and eat a deadly one and get lucky or something equally stupid. Studies of professionally identified Amanitas have shown that up to 50% of the specimens from an area may have no amatoxins in them.
Another source of problems is the paper. Be sure you do a control spot whenever you do a Meixner test. That will tell you if you're having problems with the paper. I've been told that the pages of the Wall Street Journal work well, and there's always a copy conveniently around any hospital. Another thing to watch out for is to avoid any exposure of the paper to sunlight. So be sure to take an internal page from whatever paper you're using, and don't dry your mushroom test spot in the sun.
Happy mushrooming!
-------------------- Happy mushrooming!
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