14 MUSHUOOMS, HOW TO GROW THEM. 



used in mushroom beds, is not exhausted of its fertility, 

 but, instead, is well rotted and in a better condition to 

 apply to the land than it was before being prepared for 

 the mushroom crop. The farmer will not feel the little 

 labor that it takes. There is no secret whatever con- 

 nected with it, and skilled labor is unnecessary to make 

 it successful. The commonest farm hand can do the 

 work, which consists of turning the manure once every 

 day or two for about three weeks, then building it into 

 a bed and spawning and molding it. Nearly all the 

 labor for the next ten or twelve weeks consists in main- 

 taining an even temperature and gathering and market- 

 ing the crop. 



Many women are searching for remunerative and 

 pleasant employment upon the farm, and what can be 

 more interesting, pleasant and profitable work for them 

 than mushroom-growing ? After the farmer makes up 

 the mushroom bed his wife or daughter can attend to 

 its management, with scarcely any tax upon her time, 

 and without interfering with her other domestic duties. 

 And it is clean work ; there is nothing menial about it. 

 No lady in the land would hesitate to pick the mush- 

 rooms in the open fields, how much less, then, should 

 she hesitate to gather the fresh mushrooms from the 

 clean beds in her own clean cellar ? Mushrooms are a 

 winter crop ; they come when we need them most. The 

 supply of eggs in the winter season is limited enough, 

 and pin-money often proportionately short ; but with an 

 insatiable market demand for mushrooms all winter long, 

 at good prices, no farmer's wife need care whether the 

 hens lay eggs at Christmas or not._ When mushroom- 

 growing is intelligently conducted there is more money 

 in it than in hens, and with less trouble. 



