Mold on kombucha isn't a huge problem. Of all the stories I've heard about people getting ill from contaminated kombucha, investigation reveals most such stories to be urban legends. This is a rational approach to kombucha contamination.
When mold appears on kombucha, it will almost always grow on the surface of your mother. It will look like other molds you've seen before: fuzzy flushes of growth coloured brown, green, cyan, or black. If you can spot mold on bread or cheese, then rest easy -- kombucha contamination doesn't look much different.
When you find mold on your kombucha, it's safest to dump the batch out and start fresh. Discard the contaminated culture. I have heard of people cutting moldy sections from mothers and re-using the rest; this strikes me as being unduly haphazard given how quickly SCOBYs reproduce. If you have several brews going simultaneously and one goes bad, keep the others in check -- mold spores do travel, and the other brew may be at risk.
And now, here are some images of mold growing on kombucha cultures:
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| photo courtesy of Organic-Kombucha.com |
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| photo courtesy of Organic-Kombucha.com |
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| photo courtesy of Happy Herbalist |
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