Spore-n?

The false leather guys are creating an artefact from raw material: the mycelial ´mat´ made up of hyphae. They slaughter ´em. They don´t stand up to ´plasticising´ by solvents like ethylene glycol. Dead is dead. (Although there might be zombies. . .)

I am certain Katy has a more than passing familiarity with the writings of my buddy Paul Stamets, whom I have nick-named ´St. Paul of the Mushrooms´, the owner of Fungi Perfecti. Paul led me down the ´garden path´ to becoming a part-time shii-take grower, provisioner to the kind of restaurants I can´t afford to eat in. . .
He has been an early and influential proponent of ´myco-ecology.´ He proposed setting up successive sawdust berms colonized by Stropharia to clean up polluted water running off from dairy farms into Puget Sound. This eased a conflict between the dairy farmers and the state ecology board seeking to protect the salmon fishery. Win-win. No pollution and the Farmers got a secondary crop of high protein livestock feed from the mushrooms sprouting from the berms.
Nano, I hope you know you are in an area with many people growing shii-take in the traditional Asian log-culture method.

Bob