growing Physarum Polycephalum

[Mimi Osborne]

I am growing Physarum Polycephalum for my biochemistry class and was wondering if anybody had any tips to grow it faster-- I am adding a few oats daily in hopes to get it to a large enough size to conduct my research, but it is not growing as fast as I would like. Any suggestions?

[ian]

Hi

You're not feeding enough. Don't scatter the oats, feed them in a clump and as soon as the slime has covered them add more - and roughly double the amount. Each time you feed ( twice a day at 20C) add the new oats in a ring around the colonised patch - so that it's constantly growing outwards onto fresh material. By day five you should have something around 20cm across.