These preliminary data support Reiss (1987) who has stated that "it's not so much a case of
'the' Kombucha culture, but of a great number of them". It would make good scientific sense to
stop referring to Kombucha in the singular. The already marginal literature concerning Kombucha consortia and Kombucha teas is further complicated by an unconscious supposition on
the part of many practitioners that this bacterialyeast consortium is analogous to a single
mushroom species. Biologists also have conceptual difficulties. With lichen systematics
as an important exception, microbial taxonomy is based on studying pure cultures of single species . An adequate vocabulary for naming and classifying consortia has not been developed.