The most common variety of “black” Toxic mold in the news is Stachybotrys. Yep, Stachybotrys is a mean beast. It’s myco-toxin is so potent, the weapons laboratories tried to harness the toxin for use in bio-warfare before we inticed our political heroes to quit doing that sort of thing. The problem was, they never could come up with a reliable method to growth Stachybotrys mold so that it reliably produced the toxin. Basically, they found that only a small percentage of laboratory grown cultures could be induced to produce the toxin so they chucked the program and looked for easier and cheaper ways to kill their neighbors.

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What most people don’t realize is these “toxic” molds are with us every day. The news media and trial lawyers have tried to sensationalize “toxic” mold but their stories are not credible unless associated with in very high prolonged exposures. Fresh composed vegetable/bark mulch usually contains relatively pure cultures of toxic molds like Stachybotrys.

 

But wait!!! Isn’t fresh compost used to grow organic vegetables and aren’t those same vegetables good for us. Since toxic molds are in much higher concentrations in the rich black compost and mulches used in organic gardening than in a water damaged home, and the root vegetables like carrots, onions, radishes and potatoes are constantly in contact with the “black” toxic molds and the leafy vegetables like lettuce and celery get the soil splashed continuously on their leaves and the fruiting vegetables like squash and melons sit on or near the “black” soil and are likewise in near constant contact with the soils and we gardeners often weed and  inadvertently stir up the garden soils into dusts we then breath and track into our homes and why aren’t we all dead. “Toxic” is only a word used to describe a capability. Toxicity is only part of a Dose/Response relationship.

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As with all poisons, our bodies have some ability to defend itself. It takes are rather large dose to get any of the responses outlined in literature and trumpeted by these harbingers of bad tidings. Meaningful toxic levels are very much larger than we would normally find in most homes or offices with water damage.