CULTURE IN GARDENS, ETC., WITH OTHER CROPS IN THE OPEN AIR.
THIS is a phase of culture which may be pursued to great advantage in
every private garden, almost without cost and attention. The low
ridge-like hotbeds, for example, made for both long and short prickly
cucumbers, gourds, marrows, &c., are admirably suited for growing a crop
of mushrooms under the leaves of the subjects for which they were made.
If the spawn be inserted soon after the beds are made, or at any
convenient time in early summer, the beds will come into bearing in due
course. Perhaps they may do so when mushrooms are found abundantly in
the fields; but there are thousands of persons possessing gardens who
have no fields in which to cull mushrooms, and who would like to gather
them fresh in summer or autumn, if they could not afford to grow them in
any covered structure in winter. And this is but one way in which they
may be grown with summer garden crops, as will appear from the following
communication, by Mr. Ayres, to the _Field_:--
“The finest crop and the best mushrooms I ever saw were grown in the
open ground, and without any protection at all. I will tell you how it
happened. Some years back I had the charge of the garden of a noted
hunting establishment in Northamptonshire, one of the aids to success
being that the manure of an average of nearly fifty highly-fed horses
went to the garden, the owner remarking that, whatever other things I
might run short of, there would be plenty of ‘muck.’ Well, the best of
the hunters during the summer were soiled in loose boxes, principally
under cover, and in these boxes the manure was allowed to accumulate
until it began to grow too hot for the feet of the horses; then it was
indispensable that it should be removed. About midsummer it so happened
that nearly three acres of ground had been cleared of the spring crop,
spinach, early peas, beans, &c., and I had determined to devote the
whole plot to winter brassicas, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, &c. The
ground was brashy and very poor, and consequently I determined to clear
the boxes and put the whole of the manure upon it. It was carted away so
rich in ammonia that the men who loaded it shed tears, not from
sentiment, but from compulsion; and when the manure was spread upon the
surface it was nothing less than a foot thick--so thick, that the
proprietor said it was impossible for it to be dug into the ground.
However, clearing a trench at one end of the piece, thirty inches wide
and nearly a foot deep, the subsoil was broken up with strong steel
forks, and upon that the dung covering the next strip was placed, and
covered with the surface soil of the next trench; and so the work
proceeded until the manure was put out of sight. I may remark that the
dung, especially that around the walls, contained evidence of being
strongly impregnated with mushroom spawn, though this was not regarded
as being likely to produce a crop of the esculent. A soaking rain
falling, the ground was immediately planted with brassicas, which grew
as if they could not help growing--and in fact they could not.
“We had not planted for mushrooms, nor were mushrooms expected; but,
walking round one morning early in September, a bunch of splendid
fellows presented themselves, so large and thick and solid, that when I
took them in for breakfast my _chef de cuisine_ and ‘better half’ had
grave doubts as to whether they were ‘the real thing.’ However, they
were eaten, and the present writing is a proof that they did not poison
me. Returning to the plot, I found the bunch gathered was not a solitary
one--on the contrary, the ground was literally paved with mushrooms,
many of them so large that bushels were gathered for ketchup within a
few hours; while the retainers of a large establishment, down to the
lowest labourer, were in a fortnight positively sick of them, and
cartloads rotted upon the ground.
“The evidence of this unexpected success demonstrated two things--first,
that if the ground is freely manured with _fresh_ dung from well-fed
horses, mushrooms are almost sure to be produced; and, secondly, that
the more the ground is covered with the foliage of plants, the more
certain will be the crop. Thus we found more mushrooms under savoys and
broccoli than under Brussels sprouts--the former no doubt protecting the
crop from heavy drenches of rain, which we know are very injurious to
the mushroom crop. Since this example of mushroom-growing turned up,
nearly fifteen years ago, I have frequently concentrated the fresh
manure under a row of savoys or broccoli, throwing in at the same time a
dust of mushroom spawn or the dung of a spent mushroom bed; and, except
in very wet seasons, I have rarely failed to have a fine supply during
the months of September and October. One point of success I believe to
be essentially necessary, and that is, that water shall have a free
passage through the ground at all times; hence the necessity of
trenching the ground, if you expect mushrooms as well as brassicas.”
Even in gardens where mushrooms are well grown in enclosed structures
such results in early autumn will often be desirable; while in numbers
of places where there are few or no opportunities of gathering them in
abundance under other circumstances, crops in the garden will be very
welcome. Therefore utilise the old mushroom-beds!