First of all thanks for sharing the mushrooms with us (at least to taste visually :-) and I hope you had good luck on your spore collection. My question is about spore handling. I watched the link you posted and yes he is creepy sounding. He kept stressing sterilization. Now nature is far from a sterile environment and mushrooms grow just fine in nature. Does anyone know the importance of sterilization when spore collecting / processing ? I wondered if it was the 'type' of mushrooms he was dealing with. I can understabd it for the edible ones. For me I would want to do edible mushrooms and possibly a few non-edible. We have recently learned about using mushrooms to help decompose wood chips which we will have a bunch of soon. What I learned was that if you add mushroom spores to the chips it helps them decompose better. After seeing the cost of mushroom syringes I cringed. I would pay that for edibles but would probably buy a kit instead. I was considering walking around and collecting spores of normal mushrooms via the print method you described and using them on the wood chips or simply taking those shrooms and dropping them down on top and letting nature do the rest. If I need to take prints I really did not want to go through so much trouble for the non-edible ones. Would someone with experience in shrooming touch on my question and ideas or offer better/less expensive ways of getting shrooms to assist the decomposition of the chips ? thanks !

Congrats, Mostone! That is so cool to find caterpillars on the plants at the nurseries. I have ended up buying way more fennel and rue because of finding cats. Be prepared that the butterfly may not emerge this year. I still have a chrysalis from last year! I have several butterfly cages made from large clear plastic containers (pretzels, animal crackers from Sams Club). I cut out 3 of the sides, leaving the corners for stability, and covered the holes with screen material using clear silicone bathroom caulk for "glue". These are easily sterilized between batches of cats. It is very important to sterilize cages and utensils for the monarchs, they are very susceptible to OE spore and viruses. (To sterilize: make a weak bleach solution and soak for 15-20 minutes and rinse well with water.) Enjoy the new obsession, it is very rewarding. Mechelle

Fat plants = Caudex forming plant. They can be a xeric shrub, succulents, A xeric tree, or vine. Many are considered succulents since they store water in their caudex's . There are many Many families. We just call them all Fat Plants. I don't care if they are not all true succulents ( I know nothing about the science here). I want to keep talking about them on this form so don't get no movement going to take them somewhere else! Some fat plants ( The adenums have been taken away to their own forum).

Any help will do, Dave the new plumeria guy