Have you ever wondered what kinds of mushrooms are growing in your front yard or how they keep spreading? The answer to both of these phenomenon is spores. 

We could create hundreds of blogs about how fungi spores’ work. But the short answer is that fungi make spores as their way of reproducing themselves. Spores are similar to powder or dust and are often seen puffing out when you bump the mushrooms growing in your yard. 

Why are they so important? Because spores act like fingerprints for mushrooms. They can be seen under a microscope and are used to tell us what kind of mushroom we are really looking at.  

But most of us don’t have high powered microscopes sitting around. But we can use an easy trick to get a better idea of what kind of fungi we’re dealing with. This trick is called a spore print.  

Making a spore print is simple. Just grab a mushroom from your yard and cut the top umbrella-looking piece off and toss the stem. Remember to wash your hands each time you handle the mushrooms.

Then place the top on a white piece of paper (you can also try black paper or tinfoil). 

Place a bowl over the mushroom and let it sit for a day. 

Remove the bowl and mushroom top and you should see a spore print. If spores didn’t show up, it may be that they’re white, and you need to try a different color paper. 

A spore print can be useful when trying to ID a mushroom you find in your yard, and it also makes for great natural art. If you pay attention to the patterns, shapes, and colors of the spores, you can then compare these attributes to different mushroom reference websites and books. 

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