A TALK ABOUT MUSHROOMS. 105 



is just like oranges, lifty cents a box on the tree, is the prevailing 

 price here now, and growers say they cannot produce them for 

 that. 



A. H. WiTHINGTON. 



Mushrooms in Summer. — The only reason why we cannot have 

 mushrooms in sunnner is that they are then infested with maggots. 

 The hot weather is not an insurmountable obstacle. The maggot 

 is the larva of a little fly. It commences with us in April, but is 

 not very plentiful till May ; in June nothing escapes it. After 

 August, however, it becomes less plentiful. These little flies are 

 abundant in the open air and attack every mushroom within sight. 

 They also get into every cellar, frame, greenhouse, and other 

 building easily accessible from the outside, and work their 

 mischief. 



The bowels of the earth, as in caves and abandoned quarries, 

 are inhospitable regions for this little pest, and there mushrooms 

 can be grown in perfection in summer as well as in winter. 



Mr. Abram Van Sicklin, of Long Island, has made more money 

 in mushroom growing than any other man in America. He has 

 been at it uninterruptedly for thirty years, but if you visit his 

 place he will not show you his crop, nor will he ever mention it 

 to you. Some years ago I had the temerity to ask him about 

 his mushrooms, but the only answer I got was, "Ah, there's no 

 money in them now. They are growing them in such quantities in 

 abandoned slate quarries up about La Salle that we cannot com- 

 pete with them in the market." But he was then, as he still is, 

 one of the largest shippers to the New York market. At my 

 request Mr. William Scott, of Buffalo, a keen, practical observer, 

 who has visited the cave beds near there, has written me as 

 follows, concerning them. 



Buffalo, N. Y., February 5, 1894. 

 The village of Akron is about twenty miles east of Buffalo, 

 situated on a limestone ridge. For many years immense quanti- 

 ties of water lime (hydraulic cement) have been manufactured 

 there. The layer of cement rock, ranging from seven to ten feet 

 in thickness, is in many places from twenty to thirty feet below 

 the surface earth and useless rock ; so that it is cheaper to tunnel 

 than to remove the stone and earth that is over the limestone. 



