How To Make a Spore Syringe
- Sporeshift Mushrooms Admin
- Aug 27
- 3 min read
Making spore syringes is a simple and effective way to grow mushrooms, this blog will cover a few simple steps to ensure the best chance of success and is a continuation of >> How to make a Spore Print.
Mushrooms spores are like seeds, fresher spores that have been stored well are more likely to germinate and grow vigorously.
A spore syringe consists of mushroom spores suspended in sterile water. Using sterile water is crucial to prevent contamination from other competing spores or microorganisms. Ensuring that the syringe contains pure spores of the target species—with as little competition as possible—is essential for achieving a successful crop.
Materials Needed:
Spore print (preferably on tin foil)
Clean work station
Still air box (optional - gives a better success rate)
Method:
Clean your work space before starting, ideally working in a still air box with a spore print that was made in a still air box.
Carefully open tinfoil to expose the spore print.
Take your sterile water syringe and dispense 1-2mls of water onto the print.
Stir water gently on the foil with the needle to mix in some spores, being careful not to tear the foil.
Suck water back up into the syringe.
Gently shake spore syringe to dispense spores through the rest of the water in the syringe.
Mushroom spores are very small, you will not be able to see the spores in the syringe with the naked eye but don't worry there will be plenty in there!
How to use a Spore Syringe
It's as simple as that—you now have a spore syringe ready to use. We recommend injecting 2ml into one of our >> Spore Germination Boosters. Each spore germination booster vial contains a proprietary in-house nutrient solution designed to promote rapid and vigorous germination of mushroom spores. Every vial is pressure-sterilised for sterility and arrives ready to inoculate, ensuring a clean and reliable start to your cultivation process.
There is more information on how to use our >> Spore Germination Starter Kits on the product page.
Once you have your spores in the spore starter solution leave your vial and syringe to incubate for 3-14 days. Over this time the spores will germinate and begin to grow -- the nutrients in the solution will encourage vigorous growth. If all goes well you will begin to see strands of mycelium growing.
Shake the solution for a few seconds each day which will help stop clumping and encourage lots of satellite growth shown below.
To verify the sterility and purity of your spore syringe, you can test it on agar. Add a few drops onto our >> agar plates and incubate for 3-14 days. A clean, pure syringe will show spores germinating as small satellite colonies of white mycelium that continue to grow white, indicating no contamination.
Successfully germinated spore syringes can also be directly injected into our >> sterile grain bags to make grain spawn or for a more streamlined option into our >> all in one mushroom grow bags.
Spore syringes can be stored in the refrigerator for up to a year, and sometimes even longer. However, as with any spores, the fresher they are when used, the better the results.
Further Reading
Comments