THE FLOEAL WOELD AND GAEDEN GUIDE. 309 



•without any more spawning. But I must first premise that in the 

 usual way as soon as one bed comes into bearing, another bed should 

 be made to succeed it, and so on for ever. The first mushrooms 

 ought to appear within six weeks, and the length of time the bed 

 will bear will depend on the steadiness of the temperature in the 

 soil and the surrounding atmosphere, and the supply of sufficient 

 moisture. The bed at 60' to 70", and the atmosphere of the shed 

 at 50° to 65' will be capital conditions for a profitable result. 



Now for the recipe to make one bed serve the whole year round, 

 which will be useful to those who have only one suitable spot for a 

 mushroom bed, and in fact can be carried out with such certainty 

 that it is worth the while of any person fond of mushrooms to put 

 up a shed for the purpose, witli brick wall at back high enough to 

 allow of head room within, a double roof, that is to say, rough 

 battens, and thatch all over, with a space of air between, and double 

 sides consisting of rough boards and a thick outside lining of furze, 

 or other rough warm stuff, to promote snugness within. You have 

 but to make up the bed as directed, using grass sods in front instead 

 of boards. Let it be, if possible, not less than nineteen feet long, 

 or any multiple ot" 19, as 38, etc., etc. But any length will do that is 

 convenient, as the plan to be described admits of modifications. As 

 soon as the bed is made, go on accumidating droppings as before, 

 keeping them always under cover. When the fruiting of the bed is 

 on the wane, dig out the stuff in trenches across the bed one foot 

 wide and three feet apart. Suppose the bed to be nineteen feet long, 

 the operation will result in trenches as shown in this section of 

 thirteen feet length of the bed, on the scale of a quarter of an inch 

 to one foot. 



1111 

 |t| 3 |t| 3 |t| 3 |t| 



The stuff taken out will be useful in the compost yard, for although 

 the mushrooms extract the principal goodness from it, it will be found 

 capital for fuchsias and flower-beds. If you have a dry, warm place 

 in which to store it for use, lay it up in long ridges, and you will get 

 a few more mushrooms out of it. As for the trenches, fill them with 

 a mixture prepared in the same way as the first, they will commu- 

 nicate heat to the bed, and the bed will communicate spawu to them, 

 and the bearing will continue. In the course of a month or so 

 take out trenches again midway between the last and put in fresh 

 mixture. In the course of another month take out trenches on either 

 side of the last, and so go on removing and renewing and you will 

 always have mushrooms. 



There are many other ways of growing them. They may be 

 grown on shelves in carefully saved droppings without loam, and the 

 beds on the shelves need be only twelve to eighteen inches deep. As 

 they do not want light, the shelves may range one above the other 

 from floor to roof. They may be grown in pots and boxes, in cellars 

 and cupboards, but I should think these make-shift methods very 

 inconvenient, very liable to failure, and apt to make a mess where 

 cleanliness would be more appropriate. But the rationale of the 



