I always assumed he had it beamed down from Enterprise. By the time he made the drink, enough on-board crew were infected so it wouldn't be a problem.

I've always wondered about people who heard about the planet and wanted to live there. The plants would keep the Bertold Rays from killing them and they'd be forever happy and healthy. Would the Federation allow it?

Don't know Jet I think it would all depend on whether they could grow crops to feed them because the life stock died pretty quickly because of the Bertold rays ? Which raises the question why didn't the colonist used the spores on their life stock to make them immune to the Bertold rays?

They wouldn't need to STAY there. From what was said in the episode, it was like going to Lourdes. Just stay long enough to have all your ills cured, then have someone make you mad to get rid of the spores, and you go back to your previous life, perfectly healthy.

I guess it was too far for them to drop off Commissioner Hedford for a visit. And if they had, then Zefram Cochrane wouldn't have met his true love.

I'd rather think that The Federation would come in to relocate the settlers and use the spores to cure billions

Exactly. And they'd have to protect it from Romulans and others wanting to do the same.

While watching the episode I wondered where did McCoy get the booze from to make a mint julep?

Yeah, I'm of the opinion that McCoy had supplies beamed down from the Big E. Bourbon, mint, refined sugar, even ice are unlikely ingredients for this colony to have in any abundance. Alternately, I suppose, a portable food synthesizer could have been beamed down.

Which raises the question why didn't the colonist used the spores on their life stock to make them immune to the Bertold rays?

My own hunch is that the spores were a little more discriminating than this - Jill Ireland, or a Jersey Cow? Even a symbiotic spore has to have standards.

Shameless plug: one of my all-time favorite Trek parodies I contributed to our old thread was "This Side of Paradise by the Dashboard Light." Good times, good times.

@jxh13 said:

While watching the episode I wondered where did McCoy get the booze from to make a mint julep?

Yeah, I'm of the opinion that McCoy had supplies beamed down from the Big E. Bourbon, mint, refined sugar, even ice are unlikely ingredients for this colony to have in any abundance. Alternately, I suppose, a portable food synthesizer could have been beamed down.

Or even if it happened before many on the Enterprise were affected. Maybe that's where McCoy first tried out "Just beam it down to me immediately, and never mind what I want it for. I just want it! Now move!" before working on the Horta (in the very next episode aired!).

Which raises the question why didn't the colonist used the spores on their life stock to make them immune to the Bertold rays?

My own hunch is that the spores were a little more discriminating than this - Jill Ireland, or a Jersey Cow? Even a symbiotic spore has to have standards.

Come to think of it, I'd rather inhabit Jill Ireland too.

I thought the spores were sentient ..Obviously they had no interest in making a cow's life blissful.

Side note: Bet you the animals would have reduced their working hours😅

But since those animals are in better health they would probably produce more than average because of that so that will make up for the reduced working hours.

I'm reminded, perhaps perversely, of Wilfred Brimley in "The Thing":

"D'ya think that thing wanted to be an animal? ... No, you don't understand! That thing wanted to be US!"

I guess it helps if you have a walrus mustache and eat a lot of oatmeal.

I can accept that spores had some sort of instinctive intelligence, but I'm not sure about actual sentience.

So how would the spore then recognise the difference between life stock and the very delectable miss Ireland?Exactly the point I was trying to make with my question why the colonist didn't infect their life stock with the spores .

Maybe the cows etc died of radiation poisoning before the spores got to them?

Fair point.

When in doubt, read the instructions. Spock's spores tell Kirk:

"The plants act as a repository for thousands of microscopic spores until they find a human body to inhabit."

Well it can't be just human, because there's only one planet in the galaxy/universe with those. Bad luck for the spores.