830 



The Weekly Florists' Review. 



• •• ■-!■■ >i:i; ii 1.%. I'm.'. 



not thiuk I should have mentioned this 



so soon again, as it serins iike ] Hi ss 



Mtii.ii was called 

 to this mistake by the lark of ventila- 

 tion in a ise that 1 was in 

 a few days ago. He was closing up 

 tight at night, and leaving the house 

 hrough the daj h hen i loudj , 

 so as 1 to keep things warm, as he had 

 uot started up his fires yet. But in my 

 ii this is a poor way, very poor, 



I made d anient, as he 



ii in the business several years 

 and ought to know better, but he will 

 see the effects later, and then 

 it' yen were to talk with him 1 presume 

 he would express wonder why lie did 

 not have better "luck. " 



K. E. Shuphelt. 



A MUSHROOM INDUSTRY. 



The greater portion of St. Paul, Minn., 



is Inlaid with sandstone. This rock 



readily pulverizes on being expn-i I to 

 the wind and air, but hid beneath the 

 earth'- surface is as enduring as the 

 everlasting hills. Many years tie,, 1: et 

 eaves were dug out of this reek, mainly 

 Eoi the purpose i I Btoring beer. With 

 modern met!, mi- t'..i -•. ling .and ''aging'' 

 beer, these caves fell into disuse, until 

 L. F. Lambert, a few years since, con- 

 ceived the idea of growing mushrooms 

 in them. He lias rented them in several 

 sections of the city and now has over 

 two acres of iloor surface devoted to 

 the industry, operating as the Minnesota 

 Mushroom Company. 



The caverns for the most part consist 

 of groups of passages ranging in width 

 from eight to twelve feet and in length 

 from fifty to 300 feet, being from six 

 to ten feet in height. Ventilation holes 

 from the side or top are put in at con- 

 venient intervals, so that a proper sup 

 ply of pure air is maintained in all 

 parts of the cave. 



While there are several hundred varie- 

 ties of edible mushrooms found growing 

 wild, but two varieties have yielded to 

 cultivation and only one is generally 



The mushroom requires a very even 



temperature for its development, from 



55 to 57 degrees. The other cultivated 



known as Agmicus subrufeseens 



will not thrive under 7- degrees. 



The preparation of the be. Is. the plant- 

 in- nt' the spawn, the watering, etc., all 

 iiei'nl attention. Stable manure 

 is used exclusively for making the beds 

 into which, after they heat and become 

 properly decomposed, the spawn is 

 planted at distances of twelve to fifteen 

 inches each way and in four or five 

 weeks after planting the mushrooms ap- 

 pear. At the proper stage of their de 

 velopment they are picked and shipped 

 to market. In shipping light tomato 

 boxes holding about two and a half 

 pounds each are used. These are shipped 

 in refrigerator shipping cases holding 

 LOO pounds each, the most of them going 

 to New York City, some to Chicago and 

 other nearby cities. 



Each bed lasts ab 

 from time of spawnii 

 so that four crops cai 

 year. After a bed is 



had 



■hm 



ee months 

 exhausted 

 hered each 

 nit the old 

 make way 

 i repeated, 

 succession 

 the entire 



Mr. Lambert makes aiost of the spawn 

 which he uses, and says he finds it su- 

 perior to the imported article, which 

 mostly comes from England and is an- 

 nually imported in large quantities by 

 the leading seedsmen. 



Mjr. Lambert informs me that St. Paul 

 Flops more mushrooms than any city in 

 the country and also enjoys the distinc- 

 tion of shipping mushrooms every month 

 in the year, a distinction unknown in 

 any other city. He employs seven men 

 throughout the year and ships one or more 

 cases daily. Prices vary, but the aver- 

 age shipping priee is 60 cents per pound. 

 By contract with several of the leading 

 livery stables he secures a constant sup- 

 ply of manure. During the winter 



Various Stages in the Use of Prof. Duggar's Pure Culture Mushroom Spawn. 



used, this being known as Agaricus cam- 

 pestris. There are. however, 



I I'h; a pure white, is most 



beautiful and most delicious, but bruises 



easily and discolor- tit the slightest touch. 



I it is not suited for shipping 



. is a terra cotta color, 



a brown, both of these sorts hav- 



outer skin than the white 



months the caves are heated by stoves 

 to maintain the proper temperature. 



X. Y. Z. 



SCIENTIFIC SPAWNING. 



1 no ago has some of the lagest mush- 

 room growing establishments in tho 



- try. (May and Jackson each had 



about 200,000 square feet in bed , and 



there are many others, several of whom 



were visited last spring by Prof. B. M. 

 Duggar, of Columbia, Mo., who is pre- 

 paring an exhibit for the mushroom in- 

 dustry as a part of the display of the 

 IT. S. Department of Agriculture at the 

 St. Louis World's Fair. Prof. Duggar 

 was particularly impressed with the 

 methods of Paul Swanson, on West 

 Forty-seventh street, who was having 



g I success by the use of wild spawn, 



gathered on the pastures and manufac- 

 tured into bricks on the place. Some of 

 this spawn was very prolific, some of it 

 exactly the opposite. Prof. Duggar told 

 Mr. Swanson of his experiments with 

 what he calls pure culture spawn and the 

 result is that Mr. Swanson is using noth- 

 ing else this season. This spawn is 

 grown direct from the best mushrooms, 

 either from the spores or tissue in glass 

 tubes in sterilized manure. It grows 

 rapidly and is very rigorous. It has not 

 yet been tried on a large scale but Mr. 

 Swanson was so well pleased with his 

 first trial that he decided to stake his 

 season's business on it. One of the ac- 

 companying illustrations shows the stages 

 through which the spawn passes, the cul- 

 tures in the glass tube, the brick and the 

 crop. The other picture show the first 

 bed spawned with this material. The 

 bed was of about 100 square feet and 

 only four or five inches deep and was 

 spawned at a very unfavorable season, 

 Juno 1, when the weather was very 

 warm. The picture was taken July 18, 

 and in the next three days of cool 

 weather forty-six pounds of mushrooms 

 were picked. 



A VIEW OF THE WEST. 



BY EDWARD REID. 



;ident Burton*; 



Its simplic- 



