How to get a physarum culture

[ian]

So you want slime? 

I can give you slime. I'll post physarum to anyone anywhere free of charge. 

"Free?" you say, surely that's too good to be true? 

Indeed it is, I said free of charge, not actually free. This is the slime mould collective, lone oat flakes do not get visited by physarum fairy. You must prove your worth if you want to join and engage with the network. Assimilation doesn't hurt, we promise and you might like it. 

Tell us why you want the slime, what are your hopes and fears for slimekind? Where do you you see your slime in five years time?

A paragraph, a short story, maybe a few lines of verse, how about an expressive dance? We don't mind we just want you to communicate.

In return we will let you have your very own slime sent discreetly in a plain envelope - your friends and family need never know! 

[ian]

Hey there, I used to dabble in mushroom growing - used to have king oysters and lions mane on the go and a garden path bordered with Panellus stipticus ( I wish they were edible! ). What have you go growing? You know some slime moulds are eaten by people ( physarum tastes awful by the way - don't go there )

[Evan Brown]

Lions mane and pearl oyster right now, just starting out though so we'll see how it goes.  Any tips for a noob? I've heard that physarum tastes like dirty moss, didn't know there were edible slime molds though, I'll definitely look  into those.  We're planning on getting turkey tails and chicken of the woods next. Never tried the chicken of the woods before, but I hear they taste just like chicken (but then again what doesn't?).

[Benny Fulmer]

oh my god bro

[ian]

As Franklin put his address up, here's the masterful Rap again without the personal details

Franklin Horwich

A Castle Rock State of Mind (The Inoculating Needle Hip Hop)

By DJ Slime

A Rap

Yeah, yeah
Ayo, my loving Wife, it's time.
It's time, my loving Wife (aight, my loving Wife, begin).
Straight out the beautiful dungeons of rap.

The Oats drops deep as does my cycle.
I creep, 'cause to creep is the sister of physarum.
Beyond the walls of Wire Loops, life is defined.
I think of Slime when I'm in a Castle Rock state of mind.

Hope the oates got some groats.
My denotes don't like no dirty anecdotes.
Run up to the quotes and get the notes.

In a Castle Rock state of mind.

What more could you ask for? The amazing Oats?
You complain about laboratory in the house.
I gotta love it though - somebody still speaks for the quotes.

I'm rappin' to the hen,
And I'm gonna move your den.

Slippery, green, slimy, like the Agar
Boy, I tell you, I thought you were a gager.

I can't take the laboratory in the house, can't take the Mould.
I woulda tried to grow I guess I got no gold.

I'm rappin' to the den,
And I'm gonna move your hen.

Yea, yaz, in a Castle Rock state of mind.

When I was young my sister had a chicle.
I waz kicked out without no motorcycle.
I never thought I'd see that physarum.
Ain't a soul alive that could take my sister's unicycle.

A lovely Incubator is quite the later.

Thinking of Slime. Yaz, thinking of Slime (Slime).

Begging for slime

[Nemo Andrea]

Now this is a comment that belongs uniquely to this forum.

[Benny Fulmer]

i read it out loud to my boyfriend and he laughed so hard he couldn't breathe. i think it should be framed and hung in any museum that will accept it

[ian]

Damn yeh!

[Dominik Einfalt]

Hi everybody,

i'm Dominik, an art student at the University of applied Arts, Vienna, and im right now in the process of creating a basic artificial swarm intelligence project and i really want to create a space, where the artificial create Emergence structure meets the "natural" equivalent with the Physarum. Both should influence each other and also raise the question, whats the difference in their basic behavouir. Whats "natural" and whats "artificial". I also look further to experiment with stimulating it with different techniques like magnets, electricity, sound, light, temperature,... and see, how its reaction look.

Slimy Thanks!

[Eleanor Relf]

Um. I think they're pwiddy. :)  I mean back in days of yore, when I was doing my undergrad dissertation I worked with the true mould, Aspergillus nidulans, and bred them for spore colours that were markers for cell cycle mutations (BimG11 and SuGs). That was interesting, but mostly, I just felt like they were my little babies and I loved all the colours, which explains why I am a head gardener now, and not a cancer geneticist (Although I did get a first!).  I really like your idea to produce different strains of Physarum because it reminds me of those days and I'd love to join in, but I suspect that you work in a lab with lovely equipment and consumables at your disposal, which I don't. Is there a way I can join in? 

[Evan Brown]

Don't worry, you are most welcome here.  Ian has been working to make the project as low tech as possible so anyone can easily get involved. You can even get a little fancy for a few dollars worth of supplies from eBay or dollar/pound/euro shops. Check out his other posts on the project.

[Eleanor Relf]

Thank you Evan :)

[Adrian Philip Davies]

Hello,

I have just joined the forum with a view to learning lots about slime moulds, and to photograph them in UV and also film them in time-lapse. I am a complete novice with them. I would like to get a culture to start the process please. Any advice on it's cultivation would be much appreciated!

Thank you,

Adrian