[erockrph]

I just saw this recently on Rebel Brewer's site. Seems like a cool setup to get started on ranching your own yeast, in particular from wild harvesting. This seems pretty much right up my alley - I was planning on culturing up samples from each of my fruit/berry plants this year, but I'm not necessarily looking to bank anything for long-term storage yet.

My only question for those who are a bit more in the know is whether this is a decent deal for the price? I'm mainly interested in the sample tubes, as well as the agar, parafilm, and plates. Sixty bucks seems a bit steep, but if it's in the ballpark of what everything would cost by tracking them down separately (plus shipping), then I'd send them my business. I think it's kind of cool that they're trying to build a bank of wild yeast and don't mind paying a (small) premium to support their efforts.

[tschmidlin]

http://www.rebelbrewer.com/shop/yeast-starters-and-lab-gear/yeastwrangler/

It's ~$20 worth of stuff repackaged and sold for 3x that.  However, keep in mind that you will need to buy larger quantities of stuff than you really need and you'll have to pay shipping, which will drive up your cost to above $60 for sure.  Plus you'll need to sterilize this stuff yourself, do you have a pressure cooker?  With that in mind I think it's not too bad of a deal.

On the other hand, if you are just interested in the tubes, agar, parafilm, and plates you can find that stuff on amazon.

[a10t2]

I'd bet if you have a little time to shop around you could do better on price, and get more backups, on eBay. That's where I buy almost all of my lab supplies. AS&S can be unbeatable if they happen to have what you need.