A TALK ABOUT MUSHROOMS. 113 



and the caps had become wide spread and darkened with spores. 

 This was because he had kept them, without picking, for me to see. 



Under date of January 30, Mr. Griffin wrote me: "I would 

 very much like to have you see the new mushroom ; there is no 

 doubt about its being a fine cropper and easy to grow — indeed, 

 more so than the other variety, under just the same treatment. I 

 have a lot here that we are eating every day, for I am sorry to say 

 that it does not take in the market ; in fact, before I knew it, it 

 had spoiled several shipments for me, as I packed them with the 

 other, so we have to eat them ourselves now." 



Mr. Griffin's bed that is now in bearing is built on the ground, 

 right under the hot water pipes. After the beds were spawned the 

 atmospheric temperature was kept up to nearly 70°, but as soon as 

 the young mushrooms appeared it was lowered to 60°. All of the 

 beds, till they came into bearing, were kept covered with a thick 

 layer of rank straw shaken out of the manure. When bearing 

 begins this covering is removed, except a light scattering which 

 neither prevents the mushrooms from coming up, nor obstructs 

 one in gathering them, yet keeps the surface of the ground quite 

 moist. 



The expression "spoiling his shipments," may need explana- 

 tion. He ships altogether to commission men. They do not want, 

 and will not handle, any mushroom except the old variety, because 

 their customers will not take any other, so when Mr. Griffin's 

 mixed lots reached them, they picked out and threw away all of 

 the new mushroom, retaining and paying for the old variety only. 



The new mushroom with its whitish gills, pale, lemon-tinted neck, 

 and thick, furry veil, has a good deal of the toadstool look about 

 it, and since the "mushroom poisoning" scare of last summer, 

 especially, the people look with distrust upon everything in this 

 line except the genuine A. campestris. 



Discussion. 



John M. Kinney said that he had had large experience with wild 

 mushrooms, especially Boletus, which grow in enormous quantities 

 in Plymouth County. In that part of Massachusetts there is an 

 area of three hundred square miles of pine forest, in which these 

 fungi grow in great abundance. A boy can go out for them, and 

 in an afternoon can gather five hundred pounds, at a cost of about 

 one cent per pound. Mr. Kinney had used about a ton in a 



