Cryptic crossword No 3,499

Hi Ozpiper, may not get to finish this for a while but thought I should mention there seems to be an extra s in the fodder in 4d. Maybe ‘…ensnares germ’?

All done! Lovely theme, really thoroughly worked into clues and solutions. And some great individual clues - I particularly liked 6a, 23a! 24a, 2d (after initially plonking for ‘unit’!), 8d, 10d, 17d, & 22d. Thanks for the inspiration! Just a few bits of ‘gravity’…

Thanks Ozpiper for richly themed crossword that had a suitable level of challenge for me. My only stumble was 3d. (I was a bit surprised to see 'cheat' used in both 8a and 3d.) In any event there was much to like including 6a,12a, 25a, 4d, 5d, and 16d as well as the theme itself.