What do the different colours of mould mean in my house?
Retrieved on:
Monday, June 26, 2023
Smell, DNA, Food, Blue, Parasitism, Atmosphere, Mycelium, Stachybotrys, Epicoccum, Black, Nutrient, Cheese, Fruit, Fungus, Pigment, Fusarium, Plant, Soil, Time, Smoke, Latin, Pet, Moth, MITES, Growth, Bacteria, Ecosystem, Health, Environment, Virus, Spore, Skin, Rain, Citrus, Textile printing, Truffle, Fungiculture, Trichoderma, Aureobasidium, Serratia, Aspergillus, Penicillium
The air and surfaces around you are home to multitudes of bacteria, fungi, viruses, mites, algae and protozoa.
Key Points:
- The air and surfaces around you are home to multitudes of bacteria, fungi, viruses, mites, algae and protozoa.
- A lot of this fungal growth is what we call mould.
- But what do the myriad colours that appear on our stuff tell us about the world we try not to think about?
Black
- The concept of toxic black mould is one many people have become aware of due to flood impacts.
- Stachybotrys is the one known as toxic black mould.
- When the grout in your shower turns black though, that’s a different fungus called Aureobasidium.
Blue
- That blue orange I mentioned before, you can thank Penicillium for that.
- The organism that gives us blue cheese and the antibiotic penicillin is also responsible for producing a dense growth of mould that almost looks like smoke when disturbed, spreading millions of spores onto the rest of your fruit bowl.
Yellow and orange
- In fact, some need exposure to light – and ultraviolet (UV) light in particular – to complete their life cycle.
- They produce a spectrum of staining that can often turn damp items yellow, brown or orange.
Green
- We’re all fairly familiar with the green spots that turn up on mouldy bread, cake and other food items.
- The green tuft is often from a group of fungi called Aspergillus.
- In the green gang is also a fungus called Trichoderma, which is Latin for “hairy skin”.
Pink, purple and red
- Neurospora, also known as the red bread mould, is one of the most studied fungi in scientific literature.
- It’s another common, non-hazardous one that has been used as a model organism to observe fungal genetics, evolution and growth.
- Fusarium is less common indoors, being an important crop pathogen, but will sometimes turn spoiled rice purple.
White
- One of these was hyaline and non-hyaline, essentially referring to transparent and coloured, respectively.
- This fungus is a parasite of some moths and cicadas and is visible as brilliant white, tree-shaped growths on their unfortunate hosts.