February 26, Solo Work!

I am still figuring out specific but important technicalities to my experiment.  As part of my method and procedure, I am going to dehydrate the fruiting body.  However with C. cinereus, once they release their spores, they turn goop and obviously it becomes impossible to dehydrate them.  So I am looking for another species of mushroom I can test on.
Despite still figuring out the small details, I was able to begin collecting A. niger, the black mold, by placing agar plates in contaminated areas.  This might not be the most efficient way of getting the mold, but it is convenient with the tools we have.  The plates will not be purely A. niger.  While working on this project, I am also starting another experiment with Sarah for her oyster mushroom kit experiments.  This time, we are looking into different species of oyster mushrooms and seeing how they can grow on the grow-it-yourself kits.  Along with Pleurotus ostreatus I will be testing Pleurotus djamor,and Pleurotus citrinopileatus.  They are both edible mushrooms.

Pleurotus citrinopileatus

Pleurotus djamor

                                   

Other than discussing upcoming projects, I spent the majority of this time helping prepare substrate for Caroline's straw experiment.  I was let loose to make the substrate by myself and boy was it intimidating at first.  I made substrate once or twice with Courtney and Sarah, so I had to recall the procedure.  It was a good thing that making substrate does not require aseptic techniques.  Straw was everywhere but after making a bag or two though, I got the hang of it and now I can confidently make substrate bags myself.