Are my spores bad?

[georgyboy]

One week ago today I sterilized and inoculated 11 1/2 pint jars a la pf-tek. I had four syringes from lil shop of spores and all were random grab bag. I ended up with a-strain malabar india orissa and r-44. I decided to use the a-strain, malabar, and the india and to save the r-44 for later. I did everything the same for all the jars and all the needles. Today I went and checked on the jars and NONE of the india or malabar jars have started to colonize at all. there is no white fuzzy growth anywhere within the jar. At the same time ALL of the a-strain jars are colonizing very well. Why would this be. The temperature around my jars seems to be staying around 79 degrees f. Would be warmer but the weather has been cool and rainy lately. Is it likely that these jars are no good at this point, or should I still wait it out. Should I contact the lilshopofspores? Thank you to anyone that can help me out here.

 

[Kervork]

I innoculated some bags and sat on them like a mother hen for over a month before anything showed. Then half of them turned out bad and smelled like something fermenting. Out of frustration I tossed the good ones into a tub of manure and damned if mushrooms didn't eventually grow out of it.

Patience... temperature.... patience... temperature.... and eventually airflow and moisture. Upper 70's sounds right but maybe some of them like to be warmer.

Moral of the story... shit takes times sometimes and sometimes time just turns things to shit.

 

[georgyboy]

Thanks for the reply man. So far I can't see any contamination. Just rye flour and vermiculite from what my eyes can tell. I'm going to put the jars in my grow room where it is a little warmer and maybe something will happen.

 

[sonar]

I never even heard of lil shop of spores until you mentioned them so can't really comment on their quality. Then again, I'm the type of guy who is pretty set in his ways and really don't buy spores that often so it isn't surprising.

No point in contacting them about it. Their spores are sold for microscopy purposes and aren't intended to be germinated so they aren't going to answer you. This is straight from their website.

How do I grow these spores into
mushrooms?
Please do not inquire about the cultivation of any
Psilocybe or exotic spore strains as these are intended for educational and
microscopy use only! References to cultivation
will cause us to refuse you service so don't ask!


Could be a few reasons why some of them aren't showing any signs of growth. The most common culprit is that your jars were still hot when you inoculated and it fried the spores. Did you shake the syringes well before using them? I'd give it a few more days and if you still see nothing then something went wrong. Regardless, it probably isn't the vendors fault.

 

[odessa]

dont put the jars in your grow room. There are mold spores flying around everywhere, especially if you have fans. I speak from experience.

 

[dank smoker420]

the jars i knocked up on the 24th with a bought syringe are just starting to show mycelia. i believe it depends on how long they were dropped. i took a spore print and made my own syringe and that one showed in about 4 days. i believe a slurry clone takes the fasted to colonize.

 

[mojoganjaman]

dont put the jars in your grow room. There are mold spores flying around everywhere, especially if you have fans. I speak from experience.

he is using the PF tek...has its own layer of dry verm as a filter...there are millions of spore in the air all the time...its the prep that beats 'em...I use lime in my horse-shit pasteurization bath to help hold contams off as I always spawn grain to bulk in the open in my kitchen...but this is simply how I do things...others may have different techniques they apply for their situation

 

[georgyboy]

I never even heard of lil shop of spores until you mentioned them so can't really comment on their quality. Then again, I'm the type of guy who is pretty set in his ways and really don't buy spores that often so it isn't surprising.

No point in contacting them about it. Their spores are sold for microscopy purposes and aren't intended to be germinated so they aren't going to answer you. This is straight from their website.

How do I grow these spores into
mushrooms?
Please do not inquire about the cultivation of any
Psilocybe or exotic spore strains as these are intended for educational and
microscopy use only! References to cultivation
will cause us to refuse you service so don't ask!


Could be a few reasons why some of them aren't showing any signs of growth. The most common culprit is that your jars were still hot when you inoculated and it fried the spores. Did you shake the syringes well before using them? I'd give it a few more days and if you still see nothing then something went wrong. Regardless, it probably isn't the vendors fault.

I've heard that contacting a vendor about the spores, but saying something like, "the spores didn't look right under the microscope" can lead to some compensation. I bought from lilshopofspores because they were an 8year sponsor of the shroomery forum. as for the jars being hot, I let them sit over night. I handled them with my bare hands. I think they were okay. I shook up the syringes but maybe not well enough. Come to think of it I dropped the a strain syringe, so it got a good shake from that. the rest i just kind of flicked with my finger. does that mean the remaining 5 cc in each syringe is very concentrated? could I still inoculate these jars without sterilizing them a second time. could I sterilize the jars twice? sorry for so many questions I'm just trying to figure out the fastest and least expensive way to move this forward without risking anything. I'm upset only the a strain is going because it is the strain that had the least appeal to me. It has warts on the caps and that makes me feel kinda weird.

 

[georgyboy]

also I placed the jars around my hid ballast. The thermometer now reads 84 degrees. maybe this will help.

 

[georgyboy]

dont put the jars in your grow room. There are mold spores flying around everywhere, especially if you have fans. I speak from experience.

I thought about this and put off putting the spores in there because i was worried about a increase in airborne contaminants. But i finally decided it would be safe. The jars are closed. The holes in the lids are covered with medical tape. AND there is a 1/2 inch of dry vermiculite between the lid and the actual verm and flour mix. The increase in temp outweighed the possibility of contams for me.

 

[smilinjack]

If you contact them about your spores and simply say that your syringe is faulty they may replace it. I know plenty of people that have ordered from lil shop of spores, and they are a credible vendor.

 

[georgyboy]

If you contact them about your spores and simply say that your syringe is faulty they may replace it. I know plenty of people that have ordered from lil shop of spores, and they are a credible vendor.

Thank you. I will try that. Yes I found pages of great reviews for them and they accepted a card which was very simple for me. Would've done ralph but didn't feel like messing with money order's.

 

[georgyboy]

The jars have been sitting next to my ballast for two days now and some of the malabar jars are starting to show white fuzzy growth. We'll see if they all pick up.

 

[smilinjack]

Your jars are sitting next to your ballast? Let me suggest that you build a Tub in Tub incubator, cause if they are sitting next to your ballast are they getting light? Light doesn't really affect the growth of the mycelium but you will have issues when the jars get close to finishing cause they will start pinning in the jar before all the substrate is completely colonized. At that point you have problems because if you take the cakes out of the jar with uncolonized spots they will be contam bound. And if they dont finish before the mushies in the jar start to die they will be contam bound. A tub in tub incubator is two rubbermaid or whatever brand tubs of the same size, the bottom one has water in it with a fish tank heater in it, and the top one just sits down in the bottom one. The water comes up around the sides of the top tub and warms the tub. Ideally you want to have your incubator at around 80-82 degrees cause 84-86 is optimal incubation temps for cubensis, and mycelium does produce some heat so the temp inside the jars is usually 2-4 degrees warmer than the temp outside the jars. I have a good bit of experience with mushies, still trying to get bulk to work without contams, but I have many PF Tek grows under my belt so if you have any questions feel free to PM me, I'm always glad to help. Also, with a TiT incubator you will want to add some peroxide and salt to the water in the bottom tub to prevent bacterial growth of the stagnant water, and don't forget to check the water level at least once a week because if it starts to dry out you will burn out your heater. And find a heater that has a manually adjustable thermostat, the newer ones that have the auto thermostat typically don't go past 77 degrees, which will work just fine but may be a bit slower. I needed more space so I got away from the TiT and took some black vinyl and turned the top shelf of my closet into an incubator, ambient temps are usually between 77-79 up there so it works for me, a couple extra days to incubate for me is fine because I typically run about 4-5 dozen cakes at a time.