Re: Why did mold grow on my orange faster than bread & cheese?

Hi Danielle,

There are many kinds of molds that would love to grow on the three foods 
you have listed. There could be several reasons that you saw faster growth 
on your orange.  The main reason would probably be that the bread and 
cheese contained preservatives.  These are usually added to bread and 
cheese for the purpose of preventing or retarding mold growth.  If you did 
this experiment again, you would want to choose a bread and a cheese 
which did not contain preservatives such as priopionates or sorbates.  
Other reasons for the faster growth on the orange could be that the 
particular type or species of mold on the orange had a faster growth rate 
than the molds on the bread and cheese - that is if they were all different 
species.  Other factors to consider would be the moisture contents of the 
bread, cheese, and orange skin and the temperatures that these were held 
at.  I hope that answers your question.