Mushroom Culture: Its Extension and Improvement

world over, it is scarce in many situations, and, it may be, not a few persons would be willing to make it of more frequent occurrence in their fields. T

e cannot induce it to grow in positions exactly similar to its native habitat. Found in open, sunny meadows and pastures, and avoiding the shade of trees, it is grown, as we have seen, in dark and deep mines; yet people suppose it cannot be grown in those pastures in which it happens not to be found. It is erroneously inferred that there is something in its con

ms, like most other plants, occupy but a small space in the vast expanse of soil and site which are naturally adapted for their growth. I read in a gardening journal that "it is impossible to command a crop of out-door mushrooms." I am positive that it can be done with almost as much certainty as any other crop, provided we take into consideration certain conditions. Of course, we must remember its natural wants; the more we do so, the more certain of success we may be. We know that it grows most abundantly in rich, upland pastures where water does not lie, associated with the meadow foxtail, meadow and hard fescue and cock's-foot grasses, clovers, cowslips, daisies, yarrow, &c., and also with the thistles (Cnicus lanceolatus and C. arvensis), and other plants fond of

ly 20l. worth of mushroom spawn was annually used in the mushroom-houses of a large garden, the expense necessary to spawn a large pasture might well alarm the richest of mushroom-loving landholders; but there is not the slightest occasion for pur

should be made into a potato-pit-shaped bed, and spawned in the usual manner. For this spawning it is of course necessary to obtain a little spawn, whether home-made or bought from the seedsman, or found in what the French call "a virgin condition" in the dunghill. In any case it will not be found difficult to spawn one or more beds in this way, particularly as there is nothing to prevent people drying as much home-made spawn at one time as will suffice for a year or more. The spawn should be allowed to run through this bed,

sery spawn. The ground, after the insertion of the spawn, should be pressed firm with the foot. As to the depth at which the spawn should be deposited, it would be better not to put it at any given depth, but so that while one piece of a flake may be at a depth of six inches or nearly so, others may touch the very surface. This, it need hardly be pointed out, would allow of the spawn vegetating at the depth and temperature most congenial to it. It would be most desirable to

hese are for it, the appearance of a large crop of mushrooms would have anything but a ten

e grown in the same manner under field-turnips, mangold-wurtzel, &c. The spawn which could be so easily prepared by any farmer, could be readily inserted in the sides of the drills in which these crops are usually grown, the slight elevation of which, by preserving the spawn from excessive wet, will favour its developme