TEMPERATURE, MOISTURE, LIGHT 



tions may and should be taken, as a matter 

 of course. It might be more practicable to 

 employ refrigeration for summer produc- 

 tion. Reference will be made later to the 

 control of insects injurious in this work, but 

 in this connection it is worthy of note that 

 in an experiment which I made at Cornell 

 University in 1912 it was clearly demon- 

 strated that a complete fumigation of the 

 compost permits continuous cultivation at a 

 temperature somewhat above normal. 



Under ordinary conditions a high tem- 

 perature has an unfortunate effect upon the 

 form of the mushroom. The sporophores 

 then expand and elongate so rapidly that the 

 large, heavy buttons, which make up the 

 highest quality on the market, are not pro- 

 duced. On the contrary they are like the 

 mushrooms produced when the bed is nearly 

 exhausted. This effect, however, is par- 

 tially due to a decrease in the humidity of 

 the atmosphere as the temperature is raised. 

 We have fortunately had an opportunity to 

 test on a large scale the effect of cold or 



65 



