A CryptoADAPT team conducted a field trip from 3-6 September to Mapungubwe National Park, following the project’s first workshop held at FABI. The team included Serisha Naicker, Nelesh Govender, Silondiwe Nzimande, Matthew Fisher, Marco Dias Coelho, and FABIans Cobus Visagie, Cristiane Figueiredo, Kerryn Fourie and Mabodiba Maake.

The trip put the sampling and isolation workflow covered in the workshop into practice in a new environment. Over the course of the trip, the team collected close to 300 samples from a wide range of substrates, including bird droppings, Dassie (Rock hyrax) middens, tree swabs and soil. The samples will support both the CryptoADAPT and MUFASA projects, feeding into ongoing work on fungal biodiversity, ecology and the environmental occurrence of Cryptococcus.

The team would like to thank the staff at Mapungubwe National Park for their assistance and guidance during the trip.