FAQ - Spores

How do I grow gourmet mushroom spores?

Spore cultivation is usually a more complicated and advanced process than liquid culture cultivation. Even more so if the spores are on a spore print rather than in a spore syringe. Since the sterility of the spores cannot be guaranteed in any way, injecting spore fluid directly into liquid culture or onto cereals is a risky procedure that does not guarantee cultivation success. This is because you don't know if you are also injecting contaminants present in the spore fluid. Many have success using this technique but keep in mind that success is not always guaranteed.

The most appropriate procedure would be to first germinate the spores on agar plates , so as to check for the presence of contaminants. Working with agar, however, requires working in sterile environments and a minimum knowledge of sterile technique. Many have success doing these procedures within a SAB. Once the spores have germinated on agar, and the presence of only mycelium has been verified, pieces of agar should be taken and used to inoculate a jar of liquid culture or a bag of cereals .

I used spore syringes to inoculate your Ceres oat bags, some got contaminated and some didn't. Does that mean the spores are good but not your sacs?

The spores are never completely sterile, your syringe could contain a minimal quantity of contaminants, which may not be inoculated into the bags that have colonized without problems, but which instead could be inoculated into the bags that have become contaminated. Having used the same syringe on various bags of Ceres and having obtained different results is absolutely normal and has nothing to do with the quality of the substrate. This is because each of the millions of spores inside your syringe produces mycelium with different genetics. Each inoculation will lead to different outcomes, attributable to the genetic variation of the developing mycelium and the variable risk of contamination during the injection.