18 
MUSHROOMS, HOW TO GROW THEM, 
eight inches wide at top, and there is a foot alley between 
them. Here, again, no shelf beds are used. 
One of the chief troubles with flat-roofed mushroom 
cellars is the drip from the condensed moisture rising 
from the beds, and this is more apparent in unheated 
than in heated cellars,—the wet gathers upon the ceil¬ 
ing and, haying no slope to run off, drips down again. 
Oiled paper or calico strung along A wise above the 
upper beds protects them perfectly; whatever falls upon 
the passage-ways upon the floor does no harm. 
In any other outhouse cellar, as well as in one com¬ 
pletely given over to this use, we can make up beds and 
grow good mushrooms. Mr. James Vick told me that at 
his seed farm near Rochester he raises many mushrooms 
in winter in his potato cellars; and so can any one in 
similar places. Mr. John Cullen, of South Bethlehem, 
Pa., a very successful cultivator, tells me that his present 
mushroom cellar used to be a large underground cistern, 
but with a little fixing, and opening a passage-way to it 
from a neighboring cellar, he has converted It into an 
excellent cellar for mushrooms, and surely the immense 
crops that I have seen in that cave of total darkness jus 
tify his good opinion of it. 
In Dwelling House.—The cellar of a dwelling 
house is a capital place for mushroom beds, and can be 
used in whole or part for this purpose. In the case of 
private families who wish to grow a few mushrooms only 
for their own use it is not necessary to devote a whole 
cellar to it; but partition off a part of it with boards 
and make the beds in this. Or make a bed alongside of 
the wall anywhere and box it in to protect it from cold 
and draughts, and mice and rats. You can have shelves 
above it for domestic purposes, just as you would in any 
other part of the cellar. Bear in mind that mushrooms 
thrive best in an atmospheric temperature of from 50° to 
60°, and if you can give them this in your house-cellar 
