HEARINGS BEFORE COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE. 133 
Mr. Scorr. The spawn is not visible to the naked eye? 
Mr. Woops. Yes, it is; this is the spawn—this cobweb-like material: 
The CuarrmMan. That can only be used for cultivation; you must 
cultivate the land and sow it as you would sow seed? 
Mr. Woops. Yes. This is grown principally in caves and such 
places. You can grow it anywhere, but you take one of these caves 
and put in a lot of horse manure and pack it down tight and then 
break it up into little chunks and then pretty soon that mass will be 
impregnated, and within about three weeks the mushrooms begin to 
come up. They grow for several months, and then you have to 
replant the beds. 
The Cuarrman. If you would sow that wild over a pasture it would 
not grow? 
Mr. Woops. No, it would not grow. 
Mr. Wrient. Do you distribute this spawn? 
Mr. Woops. We can. We have not the plant for making it ona 
large scale, but I think all we will need to do is to get up a stock for 
fine varieties and then turn it over to men who are accustomed to 
grow mushrooms, and sell it. They can afford to grow it and sell it 
for $6 a hundred, which is the regular price of imported spawn, and 
then we will be done with it. It is a proposition that the growers 
themselves can handle, and I think it will add—it will not only enable 
us to produce our own spawn, but will enable us to produce all the 
mushrooms we want, and we can produce enough to export them. 
Mr. Scorr. There is no danger of this spawn reverting to the 
poisonous toadstool, is there? 
Mr. Woops. Absolutely none. 
The CHarrman. I would not advise you to advertise this because 
you will have too many demands upon you. 
Mr. Woops. We do not want to advertise this, but as soon as we 
write this up in the Year Book it will be copied in this journal and 
that folirial: throughout the country, and we will get letters by the 
dozen in regard to it. 
Mr. Lamp. My constituents are already writing to me about it. 
Mr. Bowrs. About this cultivation of mushrooms? 
Mr. Lamp. Yes. 
Mr. Woops. It leaks out. 
The Cuarrman. We have mushrooms now the year around in the 
city. 
Me Bow1e. But you have to pay 25 cents extra for them with a 
beefsteak. 
The Cuarrman. Yes; they are expensive; they are sort of a luxury 
after all. 
Mr. Woops. They are in our country. 
The Cuarrman. There is not very much nutriment in them, is there? 
Mr. Woops. Yes; there isa lot of nutriment in them. They are as 
nutritious, in fact more nutritious, than the average vegetable; they 
are four times as nutritious as the same quantity of cabbages or 
turnips. 
The Cuarrman. In Europe they are a common food. 
Mr. Woops. In Europe they are the food of the poor people, because 
the poor people can grow them. They can yrow them down in their 
cellars and other places where there is no light. They do not require 
light; they can be grown in mines and caves and places where no light 
penetrates. That is the reason why it is such an important food crop, 
