Mushrooms: how to grow them, William Falconer [best novels to read to improve english TXT] 📗

wet straw; indeed, we should aim to retain all the straw that has been well wetted in the stable. If the manure is too dry do not hesitate to sprinkle it freely with water, and it will take a good deal of water to well moisten a heap of dry manure. Then throw it into a compact oblong pile about three or four feet high, and tread it down a little. This is to prevent hasty and violent heating and "burning," for firmly packed manure does not heat up so readily or whiten so quickly as does a pile loosely thrown together. Leave it undisturbed until fermentation has started briskly, which in early fall may be in two or three days, or in winter in six to ten days, then turn it over again, shaking it up thoroughly and loosely and keeping what was outside before inside now, and what was inside before toward the outside now; and if there are any unduly dry parts moisten them as you go along. Trim up the heap into the same shape as you had before, and again tread it down firmly. This compacting of the pile at every turning reduces the number of required turnings. When hot manure is turned and thrown loosely into a pile it regains its great heat so rapidly that it will need turning again within twenty-four hours, in order to save it from burning, and all practical men know that at every turning ammonia is wasted,—the most potent food of the mushroom. We should therefore endeavor to get along with as few turnings as possible; at the same time, never allow any part of the manure to burn, even if we have to turn the heap every day. These turnings should be continued until the manure has lost its tendency to heat violently, and its hot, rank smell is gone,—usually in about three weeks' time. If the manure, or any part of it, is too dry at any turning, the dry part should be sprinkled with water and kept in the middle of the heap. Plain water is what is generally used for moistening the manure, but I sometimes use liquid from the stable tanks, which not only answers the purpose of wetting the dry materials, but it also is a powerful stimulant and welcome addition to the manure. But the greatest vigilance should be observed to guard against overmoistening the manure; far better fail on the side of dryness than on that of wetness.

If the manure is too wet to begin with it should be spread out thinly and loosely and exposed to sun and wind, if practicable, to dry. Drying by exposure in this way is not as enervating as "burning" in a hot pile, and better have recourse to any method of drying the manure than use it wet. If, on account of the weather or lack of convenience for drying, the manure can not be dried enough, add dry loam, dry sand, dry half-rotted leaves, dry peat moss, dry chaff, or dry finely cut hay or straw, and mix together.

The proper condition of the manure, as regards dryness or moistness, can readily be known by handling it. Take a handful of the manure and squeeze it tight; it should be unctuous enough to hold together in a lump, and so dry that you can not squeeze a drop of water out of it.

Some private gardeners in England lay particular stress upon collecting the fresh droppings at the stables every day, and spreading them out upon a shed or barn floor to dry, and in this way keeping them dry and from heating until enough has accumulated for a bed, when the bed is made up entirely of this material, or of part of this and part of loam. But market gardeners, the ones whose bread and butter depend upon the crops they raise, never practice this method, and that patriarch in the business, Richard Gilbert, denounces the practice unstintedly.

Different growers have different ideas of preparing manure for mushroom beds, but the aim of all is to get it into the best possible condition with the least labor and expense, and to guard against depriving it of any more ammonia than can be helped. See Mr. Gardner's method of preparing manure, p. 22.

Loam and Manure Mixed.—Mushroom beds are often formed of loam and manure mixed together, say one-third or one-fourth part of the whole being loam, and the other two-thirds or three-fourths manure; if a larger proportion of loam is used it will render the beds rather cold unless they are made unusually deep. I am not prepared to affirm or deny that this mixed material has any advantages over plain manure; I use it considerably every year and with good results; at the same time, I get as good crops from the plain manure beds. But it has many warm friends who are excellent growers.

In preparing this mixed material I use fresh sod loam well chopped up, and add it to the manure in this way: First select the manure and throw it into a heap to ferment, as before explained; then after the first turning cover the heap with a layer of this loam about three or four inches thick, enough to arrest the steam; at the next turning mix this casing of loam with the manure, and when the heap is squared off add another coating of loam of the same thickness in the same way as before, and so on at each turning until the whole mass is fit for use, and the full complement of loam, say one-fourth the full bulk, has been added. In this way much of the ammonia that otherwise would be evaporated from the manure is arrested and retained.

Some growers, when they first shake out their fresh manure, add the full complement of loam to it at once and mix them together. Others, again, Mr. Denton, of Woodhaven, for instance, prepare the manure in the ordinary way and when ready for use add the quota of loam. I use good sod loam for two reasons, namely, because it is the very best that can be used for the purpose, and, also, after being used in the mushroom beds it is a capital material, and in fine condition for use in potting soft-wooded plants. But the loam commonly used to mix with the manure is ordinary field soil. If the loam is ordinarily moist to begin with, and also the manure, there is very little likelihood of any of the material getting too dry during the preparation. And much less preparation is needed, for the presence of the loam lessens, considerably, the probability of hasty, violent fermentation.

Mr. Withington, of South Amboy, N. J., uses rather a stinted amount of loam in his manure. He writes me: "We made up our beds this year with a proportion of loam in the manure, say one part loam to eight parts manure, but have always used clear manure heretofore, and I think the beds hold out longer than when only manure is used."

CHAPTER IX.

MAKING UP THE MUSHROOM BEDS.

The place in the cellar, shed, house, or elsewhere, where we intend to grow the mushrooms, should be in readiness as soon as the manure has been well prepared and is in proper condition for use. The bed or beds should be made up at once. The thickness of the beds depends a good deal upon circumstances, such as the quality of the manure,—whether it is plain horse manure, or manure and loam mixed together,—or whether the beds are to be made in heated or unheated buildings, and on the floor or on shelves. Floor beds are generally nine to fifteen inches deep; about nine inches in the case of manure alone, in warm quarters, and ten to fourteen inches when manure and loam are used. In cool houses the beds are made a few inches deeper than this so as to keep up a steady, mild warmth for a long time. The beds may be made flat, or ridged, or like a rounded bank against the wall; but the flat form is the commonest, and the most convenient where shelves are also used in the same building. Shelf beds are generally nine inches deep; that is, the depth of one board.

In making up the beds, bring in the manure and shake it up loosely and spread it evenly over the bed, beating it down firmly with the back of the fork as you go along, and continue in this way until the desired depth is attained. If it is a floor bed and there is no impediment, as a shelf overhead, tread the manure down firmly and evenly; if the manure is fairly dry and in good condition it will be pretty firm and still springy, but if it is too moist and poorly prepared treading will pack it together like wet rotten dung.

Now pierce a hole in the bed and insert a thermometer. There are "ground" or "bottom-heat" thermometers, as gardeners call them, for this purpose, but any common thermometer will do well enough; and after two or three days examine this thermometer daily to see what is the temperature of the manure in the bed. In roomy or airy structures or where only a small bed has been made it may, in the meantime, be left in this condition. But in a tight cellar I find that the warm moisture arising from the bed condenses in the atmosphere and settles on the top of the manure, making it perfectly wet. In order to counteract this, as soon as the bed is made up I spread some straw or hay over it loosely; the moisture settles on the covering and does not reach through to the manure. Beware of overcovering, as such induces overheating inside the bed. At spawning time remove this covering. The bed will then have become so cool (80° or 90°) that there is very little evaporation from it, consequently little danger of surface-wetting.

The Proper Temperature.—This, in mushroom beds, depends upon the materials of which they are composed, their thickness, how they are built, the situation they are in, and other circumstances. If the manure was good and fresh to begin with, carefully prepared and used as soon as ready, the bed in a few days will warm up to 125°, or a little more or less, and this is very good. My best beds have always shown a maximum heat of between 120° and 125°. Had the manure been used a few days too soon the heat would rise higher, perhaps to 135°, but this is too warm; in this case I would fork over the surface of the bed a few inches deep to let the heat escape, and after a couple of days compact the bed again. Boring holes all over the surface of the beds with a crowbar is the common way of reducing a too high temperature, and when the heat has subsided sufficiently fill up these holes with finely pulverized dry loam. With loam we can fill them up perfectly, but we can not do this with manure, and if left open they remain as wet sweat holes that are very deleterious to the spreading spawn.

A too high temperature in the beds should be sedulously guarded against, for it wastes the substance of the manure, dries up the interior of the bed, and the mushroom crop must necessarily be starved and short.

Provided that the manure is fresh and good and has been well prepared, if the beds, after being made up, do not indicate more than 100° or 110° no alarm need be felt, for excellent crops will likely be produced by these beds. The thicker the beds are the higher the