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Make your own spore syringes from spore prints!

Spore prints are a great way of keeping genetics safe and sound (swabs are great too but spore prints are easy to store), and every spore vendor uses these to make heaps of syringes. As usual there are fifteen thousand ways of doing things, but this is how I like to do it. The important thing to note here is that I have to make sure everything is super cleanly done, as I’m producing hundreds of syringes at a time and I can’t risk anything at that level (imagine the fun of refunding all of that), so the way I do things involves spending lots of money on a big-ass flow hood, pressure cookers, scientific equipment etc.

You, on the other hand, might just be turning a spore print or two into a buttload of your own spore syringes. It’s a super economical way of doing things, and obviously if you’re just doing your own, you can go a bit lighter on the aseptic procedures if you like. It’s probably fine, most of the time, and if I was just knocking out a few for myself at home I would very likely cut a few corners – mycology should be accessible to all, and much like the amazing Uncle Ben tek, there are various slightly hacky methods of making spore syringes that will be likely good enough to get you up and running with a minimum of expense.

I sell some of my spore prints – they’re the same ones I use to make my syringes with! They are insanely good value if you are prepared to put a bit of work in yourself, and they travel very easily to countries with uptight customs agents.

Anyway, here’s what I do:

Get some distilled water from wherever your favourite shop is. I need this because it’s got nothing else in it (they basically evaporate the water to collect it), which means there’s less chance of the spores trying to germinate and zero chance of any shit being in the water. You could take a chance and use tap water if you’re doing it at home!

Fancypants water
Fancy water for fancy lads

Place your science beaker (yeah I know it’s got a proper name but ain’t nobody got time for that) in your pressure cooker (on a trivet so it’s not touching the bottom), throw your magnetic stirrer into the beaker, and top up with lovely distilled water. The science beaker is made of Borosilicate glass, which means heat won’t fuck it up. Water in the beaker, water also in the pressure cooker. Some of this water will evaporate so add a bit more than you think you need.

Heat up your pressure cooker, and once your weight is rocking about like a motherfucker set your timer for 25 minutes. Due to the wonders of science, the water’s boiling point is now 120 Celsius, so this 25 minute blast will kill anything that might be lurking on your equipment or in your water. Once you’ve cooked stuff for the 25 minutes, turn off the heat and allow your water to cool down. This takes ages but that’s life. I tend to do mine in the evening and leave them for the next morning, as this means I can spend valuable time sleeping, which is ace. I fucking love sleeping.

Turn your flowhood on, wait 20 minutes. Put all your stuff that you are going to use in front of your flowhood – alcohol spray, alcohol wipes, spore prints, sterile scalpel (I use disposable ones, but you could easily just get an all metal one and pop it into the PC when you’re cooking your water), magnetic stirrer plate, sterile syringes, sterile luer locks (they’re the little end caps for the syringes). Clean your hands and arms thoroughly with the alcohol wipes or spray, and then I usually put gloves on and clean them too. Wipe your surfaces! Wipe everything! Overkill is your friend here.

It's the band Overkill
“Hello, we’re your new dads”

Now open your PC in front of your lovely flowhood, and, making sure you keep everything within the airflow, place your beaker full of water on top of your magnetic stirrer. Now comes the fun bit!

Use your sterile scalpel to scrape your spore prints into your water. It’s up to you how many you use, but you’ll get multiple syringes per print, easily. Turn your magnetic stirrer on, and watch the radical little spore cyclone turn your water a shade of purple. Once you’re happy that you’ve got nice bit of spore broth going on, turn the speed on your stirrer down a bit. Don’t turn it off – if it’s just gently circulating you’ll have better distribution of your spores for the next bit.

Open a sterile syringe, and suck up some of your solution. Then open up one of your luer locks, and cap your syringe. Bingo bango, you have now made a spore syringe. You are a god amongst men.

Dennis Reynolds being a Golden God
“If you say another word I swear to god I will dice you into a million little pieces. And, put those pieces in a box. A glass box, that I’ll display.”

Like I said, if you’re doing this at home you don’t have to go to these lengths. You can take a few risks! There’s a great video by Philly Golden Teacher over on YouTube that’ll guide you through it, but you basically just need some water, a syringe, a shot glass, and a pressure cooker. You can’t really get away from needing a pressure cooker in this game – it’s a really worthwhile investment though if you want to get into mycology in a big way.

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Random News Updates

Probably gonna do a podcast

Me and Chris were chatting some drunken shit the other night (I can’t guarantee his drunkenness but I was pretty pissed) and figured we might do some kind of a podcast, or at least try and do one and see if we think it’s worth half a damn, and if people are interested or not. Being a spore vendor is a really weird niche job with loads of odd elements to it, and I’m pretty sure that Chris’ job as a mycology goods supplier is equally weird, so we’re gonna give it a go. I suppose best case it’ll be a moderately entertaining chat about stuff, and worst case it’ll be godawful and you’ll never get to hear it so it’s win/win for you really. If you’ve got any questions you desperately want answering and they’re ones that I can actually legally answer, then drop me a message on my Insta page and I’ll have a crack at it!

You would not be surprised to hear that trying to find a picture of an old-school BBC DJ who isn’t a nonce is really hard

New stuff coming soon

Yes yes y’all, I’ve had some supply line interruptions thanks to Customs (it seems that no-one on earth is safe from the idiocy of customs officers), so I’ve run quite low on a few of the slower-selling varieties. However, because it’s important to have contingency plans, I’ve got plenty of other stuff ready to go. So, coming soon enough – Jedi Mind Fuck and Z-Strain will be joining the list, and maybe Mazapatec. How soon? Who knows, I need to get the writing bits sorted on the website, and get some product shots done so everything looks right. Maybe a couple of weeks, maybe a bit longer?

Time to inspect the ol’ prison wallet

Product Earth!

There’s a cool UK Cannabis expo called Product Earth, but they seem cool with the mycology world too. I was hoping to be able to attend this year, but I can’t because of a few other commitments. However, I’m gonna throw Chris and his team a shitload of my spores to sell, and they’ve got a nice big stall there – so if you are there and you’ve got a burning desire to get into the world of microscopic shenanigans, it’s gonna be nice and easy for you to get some cool spores. I will probably do a small run or two of some stuff I don’t have much of as a limited edition expo special (and tonnes of the usual stuff), so there will be the opportunity to score some hella rare mushroom spores!

Anyway, that’s all the red hot news I’ve got for now. Stay safe, keep your microscope loaded at all times, and remember: never trust a Tory.