Bioluminescent Mushrooms in the Lab and in the Forest and so Much More

At the Atlantic Forest Betary Reserve Field Station the work was enjoyable and rewarding and the staff and locals are all very friendly and welcoming. By the end of my stay everyone felt like family. I always had the weekends to look forward to because there were so many tourist activities to take part in and there was always a BBQ happening somewhere.
I was a mushroom volunteer researcher for 6 months and I spent the majority of my work week developing methods for growing bioluminescent mushroom species endemic to the Atlantic Forest in conjunction with a lab at Sao Paolo University. Another main part of my work was helping to implement a mushroom inventory process for the reserve to begin to collect, identify and catalogue mushroom species and track and maintain mushroom biodiversity. I completed scientific article research to gain updated and background information on current mushroom species identified in the Atlantic Forest and growing methods across many different cultivated and non-cultivated species. I worked to maintain mushroom mycelium cultures by replication involving media preparation, clean room, Laminar flow hood and autoclave use and sterilization practices. I helped support the Volunteer Manager with integrating and familiarizing new volunteers with the reserve and field station. Aside from all this I had the opportunity to support multiple projects including amphibian monitoring of Bd fungus effects, bioacoustics tracking, camera trap tracking, tree inventory, habitat monitoring of ponds, fish inventory of local stream, aquaponics system setup and gardening tasks. I definitely recommend IPBIO!