Procedure

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Needed Supplies!

·              Safety googles

·         Safety gloves

·         At least 36 sandwich sized plastic baggies

·         Soil core extractor

·         12 flags

·         Soil test kit (we used LaMotte soil combination model STH-14 test kit)

·         Field notebook

·         Lab table

·         108 Fungi nutrient Agar plates

1. Find 6 plants of the same species (for example: maple, oak, and fern etc.) that traditionally has a relationship with one specific kind of mycorrhizah fungi and label a flag to put at the location of each plant.

2. Find 6 plants of the same species (for example: rhododendron, and azaleas etc) that traditionally has a mutual relationship with a different kind of mycorrhizah fungi and label a flag to put at the location of each plant.

3. Label 12 plastic bags; 6 with the name of the plant in step 1, and the other 6 with the name of the plant in step 2

4. Extract a column of soil, 15 cm deep and 2 cm in diameter from the soil. The soil should be extracted 10 cm away from the base of each plant.

5. Put the soil sample in the proper bag corresponding to the soil on the bag; be sure to take all the soil samples from all of the plants on the same day at the same time and around the plant's base so we are able to control for weather.

  

6. At the same time as you are testing each soil sample for potassium levels (ppm), use the fungi protocol to do serial dilutions to determine the number of mold per cm³ soil.

7. Follow the fungi protocol, you should alcohol/ disinfect the lab station
 
8. Allow to grow for 48 to 72 hours
 
9. Examine each of the plates for individual fungi colonies on the same day at the same time to count molds. (Molds are indicated by larger ‘fuzzier’ circles)
10. Choose the most dilute plate for each soil sample that has mold on it to make your estimates of the number of fungi in the original 1 cc soil sample using the following formula:

                    
          # Microbes 1/cc of soil= # Colonies on sheet x 102 x 10|dilution # at which these colonies were found|
11. Repeat Alchohol/ disinfect the lab station following counting
12. Repeat steps 3-11 on two additional days.