112 



THE GARDENER'S MONTHLY 



[Aprily 



leached however — leached ashes have but little 

 eftect comparatively. Ifow, if Mr. Black's the- 

 ory be correct, we have at once a remedy for 

 the blight and can have plenty of strawber- 

 ries by tlie application of ashes after the man- 

 ner that Darwin produced clover seed by in- 

 creasing the number of cats. 



EDITORIAL NOTES. 



Mushroom Culture. — The lecture of Mr. 

 J. J. Smith, before the Germantown Horticultu- 

 ral Society recently, has stimulated inquirers in 

 this neighborhood as to the best mode of cul- 

 ture. We have thought it might serve our read- 

 ers to introduce here what Mr. R. Buist, Jr. says 

 of their culture in his excellent Garden Al- 

 manac : 



" Mushrooms may be cultivated much easier 

 than is generally supposed. They can be grown 

 in a cellar or shed, or in beds prepared in the 

 open air in the same manner as hot-beds. Take 

 fresh horse manure, shake it well apart, and lay 



FRENCH MUSHROOM BEDS. 



it into a heap to ferment ; turn and mix it well 

 every three or four days, by shaking the outside 

 of the heap, which is cold and the inside 

 which is hot, together, so that every part of 

 it may be equally fermented, and deprived 

 of its noxious quality. When the dung is 

 in a fit state to be made into a bed, which will 

 be in two or three weeks after it has been put 

 together to ferment, select a dry spot for a foun- 

 dation ; mark out the bed, which should be four 

 feet wide, and as long as you choose to make it. 

 In forming the bed, mix the dung well together, 

 beating it down with a fork until from eighteen 

 to twenty-four inches thick. In this state it 

 may remain until the temperature is sufficiently 

 moderate for spawning, which may be ascer- 

 tained by trial-sticks thrust into different parts 

 of the bed. Divide the large cakes of spawn 

 into small lumps, plant them two inches below 

 the surface, and six inches apart, covering with 



two inches of fine light soil, and press down 

 evenly. When finished, cover the bed a foot 

 thick with clean straw, and protect from heav}^ 

 rains. The mushrooms will make their appear- 

 ance in from four to six weeks, according to the 

 season." 



We would add to this that the shaking up of 

 the materials every few days before using, as 

 we have understood it, is not so much to assist, 

 or to prevent violent fermentation ; also in addi- 

 tion we append the following from an English 

 source : 



" Materials should be collected at once for the 

 making of fresh beds at the close of this or 

 beginning of next month. Fresh droppings 

 from horses fed upon dry food only are suitable. 

 They should be thinly placed in a shed or other 

 dry place so as not to heat, but if the bulk be 

 considerable throw the droppings into a heap, 

 and when warm and giving off steam, the inte- 

 rior of the heap having parted with about half 

 its natural moisture, the bulk should be turned 

 so that the outside is placed inwards ; and when 

 that is heated, the material being about half 

 dried, spread the heap out thinlj^ upon the floor 

 so as to prevent further heating. The drying of 

 the material in that way prevents overheating, 

 and consequent over-drying of the beds when 

 made up. 



A Sawdust Pudding. — The Country Gen- 

 tleman is cultivating the facetious. In a late 

 issue it says : 



" A correspondent of the Gardener's 

 Monthly, living in jSTew Hampshire, fur- 

 nishes an example of a successful orchard, 

 with trees standing in grass. The laud was 

 never plowed, the ground being unusually rocky. 

 The trees, however, have been regularly and 

 liberally manured. The writer seems to have 

 overlooked the fact that it was the manure and 

 not the grass that made the trees grow and bear 

 so well. We have heard of the farmer who 

 found sawdust pudding ah excellent feed for 

 his cows ; all that was necessary was to add 

 liberally of Indian meal — and, in fact, the lar- 

 ger the proportion of Indian meal, the more 

 satisfactory was the effect of the sawdust. We 

 are reminded of this anecdote by much that is 

 said in favor of grass in young orchards." 



Our jovial contemporary may possibly come 

 across another old almanac joke sometime 

 which will "remind" him, that it is not the 

 harrow which is of so much benefit in the " cul- 



