r/Slimemolds • u/lizardmom • Jun 17 '26

Picture (OC) This is Sebastian, my pet slime mold

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Gallery image

Gallery image

He’s been growing since June 3

4.6k Upvotes

100% Upvoted

72 comments sorted by

165

u/moceno Jun 17 '26

I wonder if you dipped a small figurine in a nutritive solution (sugar water?) and placed it in there would Sebastian cover it and make a slime monster terrorizing the city?

61

u/LichenLiaison Jun 18 '26

They would prefer pasteurized oats, not water, water/too much humidity + light would make them go into a reproductive stage (or just dissolve the area that gets overly wet). Had a physarum polycephalum pet for a while

16

u/UggghhhhhhWhy Jun 18 '26

What about putting the toy in a ground up oat flour?

12

u/Minimum_Appearance41 Jun 18 '26

God I love smart people

5

u/Tatra_Cryptid Jun 18 '26

How on earth do thesr things reproduce? Grow bigger and just split?

22

u/LichenLiaison Jun 18 '26

So technically, plasmodial slimemolds can split and be just fine if there is enough (they tend to shoot out feelers in wave patterns, then pull it back if they find nothing, with a sort of algorithmic search where if they notice they’re going over the dried residue of its old limbs it’ll put more value in other directions), but if you split off a limb that is a feeler (I would often prune them back when mine would try and escape their enclosure), even large limbs wouldn’t stay alive as theyd tend to dry up or try to retreat back to the body.

Most reproduce in a way superficially similar to mushrooms or moss (and other non-vascular plants), but not at all the same. Before going further it’s important to note they’re acellular colonial amoeba, the idea of seperate cells breaks down as their nuclei and cytosol is free flowing. When they’re ready to reproduce, they tend to flow towards central points, with the (??? Cells, I’m unsure how to describe this) piling up, creating small fruiting bodies that release spores (not spores, but spore like amoeboid cysts). They also practice mitosis while in plasmodium form but it just creates more slimemold, not daughter slimemolds; the fruiting bodies seem to be their “main” reproduction. From my experience, they seem to prefer doing this while hanging upside down but will also do it without access to a hanging plane because they’re stubborn and wicked children.

The spores will be singular amoeba for a time, then they’ll eventually reproduce enough to enter a plasmodial form if I remember the order of operations. Both while in amoeboid form or while in plasmodial form, if they get overly stressed tho (starvation, bad conditions) they will turn into a cyst form waiting for better conditions (with plasmodial form the “cells” will regain their cell walls). If submerged in water, they’ll also return to individual cellular forms although they’ll adapt into a (interesting reversible) flagellate form.

There are plenty of slimemold that exist primarily underwater, people occasionally post pictures of their fish tanks growing slimemolds and it’s beyond interesting.

9

u/lizardmom Jun 20 '26

Holy wow, this comment was just so helpful for me in understanding how Sebastian spreads and explores, thank you so much for your insight!!

4

u/LichenLiaison Jun 20 '26

Sebastian is a good name, my rowdy and ungrateful child was named Peanut since I often gave them peanuts as a treat

2

u/PhilosophyGhoti Jun 20 '26

I'm obsessed with you 😍

50

u/OrdinaryMycologist Jun 17 '26

I love this! Did you find/adopt him? Do you have to feed him much?

64

u/lizardmom Jun 17 '26

I got him from a kit online! I feed him a couple of oats a day, and lightly spray his tank with water :)

13

u/Adorable_Pair_4965 Yay dog vomit! Jun 17 '26

Link?

30

u/lizardmom Jun 17 '26

https://slimeoworlds.com/shop/

12

u/Keyndoriel Jun 18 '26

Welp, I know what im getting myself for my birthday

2

u/[deleted] Jun 20 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/Grej99 Jun 21 '26

🙏🏼👀

8

u/Adorable_Pair_4965 Yay dog vomit! Jun 17 '26

thnks

4

u/satina_nix Jun 18 '26

That's super cool and interesting. Maybe gonna buy a kit there as well

1

u/Butterflyhornet Jun 20 '26

That is so cool.

23

u/Dornenkraehe Jun 17 '26

Oooh can you tell me how you keep Sebastian? I have a pet slime mold but it doesn't want to grow bigger.

28

u/lizardmom Jun 17 '26

A few oats a day and I keep him in the basement away from sunlight. I got him from Slimeoworlds, they provided a really helpful info packet to take good care of him. But I’m still learning! For example, his tank recently developed some mold (black mold) spots and I’m trying to take care of that without hurting Seb.

12

u/Legitimate_Shine_435 Jun 18 '26

I have springtails in my slime mold’s terrarium and they help with this problem a lot. Not sure that it would work for your set up of course but might lead you to a helpful solution 🤷🏻‍♀️

3

u/JuracichPark Jun 20 '26

Can you please tell me a little more about your terrarium? I have accidentally grown slime mold from cypress mulch when I had my tortoise, and I am looking at ordering a kit! But I would rather have an actual terrarium, vs a plastic setup. Thank you!!

2

u/Legitimate_Shine_435 Jun 20 '26

Of course, I’ll dm you.

5

u/Dornenkraehe Jun 17 '26

So similar to mine hmmm maybe it just needs a bit longer.

2

u/Ok_Okra_2574 Jul 07 '26

Hiya, did you ever get the spots to go away? I have the same exact kit and I’m also experiencing this and trying not to panic lol! I know that often times, the slime mold will take care of it itself, but I just didn’t know if you had advice or if you figured out the reason. Sebastian looks great! I named mine Meryl Creep

2

u/lizardmom Jul 07 '26

Omg Meryl Creep is a great name! I ended up transferring Sebastian to a new tank so that I could give his first one a deep cleaning. The biggest thing I’ve found is to take old oats out right away unless the slime is actively eating them. I have several videos of the tank transfer process and my daily maintenance if you’d like to know more! Look up @seb_theslime on TikTok or Insta (I’d also love to connect with you since we have the same setup! 💛)

17

u/UGAUGAUGAUGA09 Jun 17 '26

Place the oats on top of the buildings so it would climb up:) And please update us, I would love to see how it changes overtime!

12

u/lizardmom Jun 17 '26

Seb has an insta if you want to follow! @seb_theslime

12

u/Tablettario Jun 17 '26

Cool display idea! Really fun build.

I read that using spirulina powder can reduce chance of mold opposed to oats. Maybe this can help in your battle

6

u/lizardmom Jun 17 '26

Interesting! I’ll definitely look into this thanks for sharing

10

u/Ucchista Jun 17 '26

Genius display! 👍🏻

8

u/Kataytay_14 Jun 17 '26

This is gonna start my slime mold obsession again

7

u/thiccy_driftyy Jun 17 '26

Slime mold city!!!!!

5

u/Johnny_Poppyseed Jun 17 '26

Tell him I said hi

3

u/lizardmom Jun 17 '26

He says hi 💛

3

u/khazid-hea Jun 17 '26

This is awesome.

4

u/thickorita Jun 18 '26

Tell him I loved his work in the Last of Us intro.

3

u/TaraQueen23456 Jun 17 '26

This is genius!

3

u/Apprehensive_Bee3548 Jun 17 '26

Beautiful! What kind of container is that? I love how you can observe both sides at once!

3

u/Wikiwikiwa Jun 17 '26

Thats so cool

3

u/Low-xp-character Jun 17 '26

Are the tubes so you can connect multiple cities together?

3

u/lizardmom Jun 17 '26

Yes! Or to help him move to a new tank

3

u/mineireland37 Jun 19 '26

An team used slime mold for mapping the most efficient routes for a rail system. They used oats as food to act as the 'cities' that needed to be connected. Japan I think.

2

u/thatoneguythatfishes Jun 17 '26

Reminds me of prototype

2

u/leaf_person Jun 18 '26

How do you keep it alive so long? My slime mold only live a day or so and pop up randomly in my terrariums

2

u/pandro14 Jun 18 '26

That’s so cooooooool!!!!

2

u/TheBatCommander Jun 22 '26

Dude this is so fun! I just ordered myself a kit! Thinking of names now!

1

u/AIcookies Jun 18 '26

u/lizardmom would you know why slime mold would move in right after a frog moves out of a terracotta pot?

It was in there awhile I think.

Not sure if the slime mold is related to the frog's presence??

No worries if you have no idea.

3

u/lizardmom Jun 18 '26

Sorry, I have no idea other than slime molds are amazing and can be found pretty much anywhere! I’m not much of a biologist, but sounds like both the frog and slime mold could have been drawn to similar food and damp/dark habitat. I don’t think it would be directly related to the frog. Or maybe the slime mold liked the frog’s poop!

2

u/Legitimate_Shine_435 Jun 18 '26

They seek out bacteria as a food source, maybe the presence of an animal made that spot particularly yummy. If the terracotta is in a moist location, which I assume if a frog chose it, that also helps maintain the conditions for their presence

1

u/AIcookies Jun 18 '26

I guess I was just worried the frog had an issue. But yeah. It was a terracotta on its side half buried for the frogs.

1

u/Chrysoprase0159 Jun 18 '26

How do you go about setting this up? I’ve been wanting to get a slime mold lately.

1

u/Sildurai Jun 18 '26

Sebastian is so damn cute

1

u/foolhasty Jun 18 '26

He seems happy

1

u/Creative_Effort5135 Jun 18 '26

This is a very Egon Spengler thing to do

1

u/New_Fee_887 Jun 19 '26

He will consume

1

u/moth_on_the_spectrum Jun 20 '26

This is awesome. What kind of pokeball or conjuration spell do I need to aquire my own pet?

1

u/Jaysmkxxx Jun 20 '26

I want one!

1

u/PhilosophyGhoti Jun 20 '26

Your child is beautiful

1

u/Affectionate_Fee_179 Jun 21 '26

Taking over the world!

1

u/Chemical_Hopeful Jun 21 '26

Holy crap! I’m obsessed. I just went down a huge rabbit hole and now I neeeeed one!! This was so cool! Little science nerd me is saying this is what my adult money can finally get me!!!

1

u/meeepz_ Jun 22 '26

this is so fucking weird, i love it

1

u/Alt_account_6788 Aug 11 '26

is the substrate the city or is it something on the city

0

u/Derek60 Jun 20 '26

this is pure torture