How to make a spore print
Image by Jonathan Carmichael
With the onset of Autumn comes fungus season, with mushrooms of all shapes, sizes, and colours. To properly identify a mushroom, we rely on a number of features such as where a mushroom grows and what it grows from, the colour and texture of the cap, the colour of the gills and how they are attached to the stem, and whether the stem is fibrous or fragile.
An additional diagnostic aid is the colour of the spore print - spores come in various colours, white, pink, brown, black, purple, or in some cases, differing colours based on the light. Many species can be confused with others, and a spore print can help tell species apart.
This brief spore print guide gives step-by-step instructions to make a spore print to assist in identification.
Entheogenesis Australis is grateful for the support of the ethnobotanical team that developed this resource. Collaborators included fungi educator, and psychedelic mushroom expert Caine Barlow, MYCOmmunity Applied Mycology's Ema Corro, and drug science communicator Liam Engel. The guide also includes images from Jonathan Carmichael and other fantastic photographers.
If you find this resource helpful, please support EGA so we can make more!
If you enjoy these resources or all things fungus, our fourth Microdose episode, Fungi Foragers featured fungi experts in a panel discussion about the world of mycology. We cover safety, ecology, and conservation. The panel also gives some basic ID tips for the 'active' species such as Psilocybe subaeruginosa, Psilocybe semilanceata, and Psilocybe alutacea.
