The short answer
Culture Cave has three Australian vendors: two Australian spore vendors, What The Fungi and Summer Breeze Mycology, and one Australian mycology vendor for lab and growing supplies, Aus Myco Kingdom. They overlap less than you might expect, so if you came here looking for the best spore vendor Australia has, the more useful question is which store lists the thing you need.
- What The Fungi for spore syringes, isolated spore samples, deluxe spore prints and swab sets, wild Australian landrace collections, and international shipping.
- Summer Breeze Mycology for a wide range of 10ml LC syringes and colonised cubensis agar plates, shipped within Australia only.
- Aus Myco Kingdom for sterilised grain bags, substrate, all in one bags and pre-poured agar plates.
All three are based in Australia, so an order from any of them travels by Australia Post or a courier, is priced in AUD and never crosses the border. The mushroom spores Australia page gathers every Australian listing in one place.
What The Fungi: syringes, isolates, prints and landraces
What The Fungi is an independent Australian outfit, and its store is the broadest of the three for spores. It lists 10ml spore syringes, 10cc isolated spore samples, 10cc isolated liquid cultures, and deluxe spore print and swab sets. It is also the only one of the three whose store ships worldwide as well as within Australia.
Its labels carry a lot of detail: most titles give the parents of a cross in brackets, and the descriptions say who made the cross or isolation, whether that is What The Fungi itself or another breeder such as Moondaddy Myco. Black Betty Gates is a good example: the listing credits the original isolation to Dichotomous Keys and the clone it sells to What The Fungi.
What stands out most is the wild Australian material. Wild cubensis in Australia is found in the subtropical and tropical east, in Queensland and northern New South Wales, on cattle dung, and that is where these collections come from. Mt. Cotton and Frilli Vanilli are listed as wild Australian landrace spore syringes, and Farmers Forage, which the listing says is named after the farm paddock it came from, as an isolated liquid culture. The listings credit the wild collections to Australian foragers, Sporexchange and Onlyspores among them.
There is also a Panaeolus cyanescens isolate, Pan Cyan Eungai B.I.G, which the vendor says was first found in Australia by Sporexchange. The Australian landraces post covers these collections in more detail, and spore prints and swabs explained covers the print and swab formats.
Summer Breeze Mycology: a wide range of 10ml LC syringes
Summer Breeze Mycology is an Australian-run supplier of genetics for the collector, microscopy and taxonomy community. If you want an Australian liquid culture vendor with a long list to choose from, its store is built around exactly that: a large range of 10ml LC syringes, with colonised cubensis agar plates alongside. The store ships within Australia only.
The labelling is consistent: every culture title is the strain name followed by "10ml LC Syringe", which makes the range quick to scan and compare. A few listings add a note on appearance or origin. The vendor describes True Albino Teacher as a classic culture recognised for its albino appearance with blushing blue gills, and says its Tidal Wave line has been worked by Summer Breeze and shows a blue gill trait.
The range runs from classics such as Jack Frost to reverts, isolations and less common names, many of which no other Australian vendor on Culture Cave lists. The colonised agar plates are listed as made to order, and the listing gives a dispatch note worth reading before you order. The liquid cultures in Australia post and the liquid cultures Australia page cover this format more broadly.
Aus Myco Kingdom: grain, substrate and agar plates
Aus Myco Kingdom, often called AMK, is an Australian substrate and lab supplier rather than a genetics store. Its listings cover sterilised grain bags and all in one grow bags (each in 1kg and 2kg), premium CVA substrate bags, and a 3kg wood lovers substrate, a hardwood based mix made for wood-loving gourmet species such as shiitake. The vendor notes that all its substrates are sterilised.
For lab work, AMK lists pre-poured agar plates in two versions, high nutrition and low nutrition. The vendor describes the low nutrition plates as suited to spore germination, liquid culture testing and isolation work, and the plates come in a choice of colours that buyers specify in the order notes. Gourmet liquid cultures are listed as coming soon.
AMK is the store to look at for gourmet growing and agar practice. The mycology supplies Australia page and the Australian supplies guide cover that side in more depth.
Lines both What The Fungi and Summer Breeze list
The two spore vendors share only a handful of names, and comparing them shows how much labels can differ.
- Leucistic Hell Hound: What The Fungi lists it as a 10ml spore syringe, Summer Breeze as a 10ml LC syringe. A spore syringe holds spores and a liquid culture holds living mycelium, so these are different formats under one name.
- Dawg Phish: What The Fungi gives the two parent lines in the title, calls it an isolated liquid culture and credits the cross to Moondaddy Myco. Summer Breeze lists it as DawgPhish, a 10ml LC syringe, under the strain name alone.
- Golden Satellite: What The Fungi lists Golden Satelite (spelt that way on the listing) as an isolated liquid culture and calls it the vendor's very first cross. Summer Breeze lists Golden Satellite 186 as a 10ml LC syringe. They have separate strain pages and the listings do not say how they relate, so ask if it matters to you.
Two habits explain most of the differences. What The Fungi writes "10cc" and Summer Breeze writes "10ml", which is the same volume. What The Fungi puts "isolated" in many titles, while Summer Breeze titles name the format only. A number on the end of a name marks a particular cut: the guide to reading a strain name explains these conventions, isolated vs multispore syringes covers what "isolated" should mean, and albino, leucistic and true albino explained untangles those words.
Overseas vendors that ship to Australia
Several overseas vendors have stores that ship to Australia, including Fungus Frequency and Telly Monster Myco in the United States and Kaiju Cultures in the United Kingdom. An overseas order adds a border step: Australia has strict biosecurity rules on fungal and other biological material, and parcels can be inspected, held or destroyed at the border. Live cultures in particular may need an import permit, so check the Department of Agriculture's BICON import conditions database first. Buying from an Australian vendor means the parcel never crosses the border at all.
How to judge Australian spore vendors, or any vendor
Whichever store you choose, the same four checks apply.
Reviews on the store page. Read what buyers say about labelling, packing and communication, not only whether they were happy.
Clear isolate labelling. A good listing says what the line is, whether it is isolated or multispore, and who made the cross or isolation.
A dispatch note. Made-to-order items should say so. Live cultures and agar plates are heat sensitive, spores much less so, and a parcel left in a hot letterbox or sitting in a depot over a weekend suffers. The post on ordering cultures in the Australian summer covers this.
Answering messages. Send a question before you order; a clear, prompt reply about a label or lineage is a good sign.
The guide to choosing a spore vendor goes through these checks in full, and the spore vendors overview covers vendors in every country on Culture Cave.
The legal side
Psilocybin and psilocin are controlled substances in Australia, and spores contain neither, but the law on Psilocybe spores differs between states and territories and some restrict their sale or possession. Psilocybe and Panaeolus spores and cultures on Culture Cave are sold for microscopy and taxonomy use only, and buyers must check the law in their own state or territory; nothing here is legal advice. For the wider picture, see buying mushroom spores in Australia and the spore syringes Australia page.