1901 ] Torrey, — Raising Mushrooms in a Cellar 57 
RAISING MUSHROOMS IN A CELLAR. 
JOSEPH TORREY, JR. 
In 1897 and 1898 I undertook to cultivate mushrooms in my 
cellar. I had good success; and it has been suggested that my ex- 
perience may be helpful to others who are desirous of making ex- 
periments in this direction. 
My first bed was six feet long by four feet wide. The materials 
used in its construction were two barrels of horse manure, two and 
one half barrels of fresh loam and three bricks of mushroom spawn. 
The bed was constructed as follows: The manure, which had been 
carefully gathered so as to be as free as possible from straw, was 
spread out in the basement of a barn near by, and allowed to 
“heat,” or ferment. Each day it was turned and left in form of a 
long * windrow." This was kept up till the man reported that the 
manure was nearly through heating. It was then brought into the 
cellar, after having been gone over once more to get out the last 
pieces of straw, and mixed up carefully with its own bulk of loam, care 
being taken that no lumps should remain, and that the whole mixture 
should be smooth and uniform. A layer of this mixture was then 
laid on the cement floor of the cellar and tramped or beaten into a 
firm mass about three inches deep. Another layer was now put 
down and the process continued till the bed was about ten inches 
deep. After standing for a few hours the bed had, as I found by 
making a hole down through it, about the same temperature as my 
hand, and this is about the right temperature for spawning. The 
second year I had to wait a day before the temperature came down 
to this point, but I am sure I could manage, with my past experi- 
ence, to judgethe condition of the manure in the windrow so that 
when it was put in the bed it would be ready to spawn at once, and 
I think anyone could. To spawn the bed, the spawn was cut into 
pieces about the size of a small egg, and each piece was put into a 
hole about four inches deep, and carefully covered with the manure- 
loam mixture. The holes were about eight inches apart as nearly as 
I can remember, at all events there were about sixty holes. I left 
the bed in this condition over night. The next day I put on four 
inches of loam and beat it down into a fairly compact form — not 
nearly so compact, however, as the underpart of the bed. 
