request: deuteromycete key and growth media

[Steven Carpenter]

1. Try Domsch & Gams "Compendium of Soil Fungi" for keys and references
   to other keys.  Barnett is really about high school level anymore.
   Get your nose into the library and spend some time with the indices
   to Mycologia, Canadian Journal of Botany and Biological Abstracts.
   Index of Fungi would be another great help if your library has it.

2. Inexpensive MEA: You could try making your own media.  Go to a
   health food store and get agar (used in making various Japanese
   confections).  Use unhopped "Blue Ribbon Malt Syrup" as your
   source of malt.  Use the "Plant Pathologists Handbook" or
   "Mycology Guidebook" for recipes.  You are paying a premium to
    have someone else make and dry ready-made media which lose
   potency over time anyway.

3. Be sure to use a light source (fluorescent + incandescent)
   for your cultures.  Give them a photoperiod.  This will also
   assist in sporulation.

-Steve Carpenter
 Cascade Research Associates
  & Abbey Lane Laboratory
 microbe at peak.org