Spore Printing by Carla Wick/Jandelle Petters
Carla Wick/Jandelle Petters

Spore Printing by

A bit of a lesson here…….
If you’re ever trying to figure out certian species of mushrooms….
spore prints are a MUST!
As you can see…I set the cap of this gilled mushroom onto half a white/half a black piece of paper. Often a mushroom will have white or such pale colored spore that the black paper is a must also. And sometimes? The spore is so DARK that the white paper is in need!
I’m still getting an ID for this brown spored mushroom that I found growing in my yard a couple days ago.
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Colors spore comes in?
Pink
Black
Purple
White
Brown
Rust
…sometimes the colors are darker/lighter to make them seem another shade.
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Spore, by the way, is the way mushrooms send out their seeds. Each tiny dot of color is it’s own continuing life-cycle of each fungi they’re carried away from.

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Tags

fungi, toadstools, mushrooms, tutorial

Comments

  • InPort
    InPortalmost 3 years ago

    Yowza Carla!

    Thank you so much for this very well presented lesson.
    Spore printing is something I have yet to do and something that I wish I had done on some occasions when it seemed nigh on impossible to identify a subject any other way.
    Good for you kiddo!

    GB
    Dennis

  • well thank YOU Dennis! the whole first year i photographed mushrooms i don’t think i ONCE took a spore print…….no WONDER i didnt’ know what i was looking at. lol

    – Carla Wick/Jandelle Petters

  • LavenderMoon
    LavenderMoonalmost 3 years ago

    You all over it, Carla… amazing! Whoda thunkit??

  • haha! weeellllllll….all the mushroom people who yelled at me ‘What do you MEAN you didn’t take a spore print???’…lol

    – Carla Wick/Jandelle Petters

  • P3T3
    P3T3almost 3 years ago

    What do you do with the spores?…Do you grow them? Nuture them, raise them from a tiny spore into something of a wonder of nature………and then eat them!!

  • some spore are easily trasferred this way to grow later? i’ve not done it yet as i don’t have the supplies to do it successfully
    but remember Pete? These are eggs…the actual mushroom is only the fruit…..the BODY is in the wood/ground/plant it’s growing on

    – Carla Wick/Jandelle Petters

  • Heloisa Castro
    Heloisa Castroalmost 3 years ago

    wonderful work Carla

  • thank you Heloisa! just trying to help some when some people wonder if it’s an edible ‘Flammulina velutipes’…or a DEADLY ‘Gallerina autumnus’…..sometimes it can make ALL the difference in life or death!

    – Carla Wick/Jandelle Petters

  • Kristian Faul
    Kristian Faulalmost 3 years ago

    nice one!

  • thanx Kris! originally i’d thought this mushroom was an Amanita? but found out purely because of spore color……..it’s NOT! :o)

    – Carla Wick/Jandelle Petters

  • robmac
    robmacalmost 3 years ago

    Make for a nice picture for whatever the reason, spot on

  • Esther's Art and Photography
    Esther's Art a...almost 3 years ago

    Thank you so much Carla, I will keep trying. The last one I did , I hqad no result. I don’t know the reason. I might try again this weekend. Cheers Esther Ps Love this image , great example !!!!

  • thanx Esther and good luck with the attempts! i know sometimes they’re too dry or even too immature to produce spore sometimes? i’ll get some that i can get SEVERAL spore prints over and over…and others that won’t give me one!

    – Carla Wick/Jandelle Petters

  • Esther's Art and Photography
    Esther's Art a...almost 3 years ago

    Ahhhhh Thank you for telling me this . I thought I did things wrong. I’ll keep trying then :o) Cheers Esther