Expert: Long Island Gardener - 10/26/2006

Question
You mentioned, maybe sarcastically, I'm not sure, that if someone wanted to grow toadstools they should ask you.  I want to grow toadstools in a pot for my Irish living room.  I uprooted some in the neighbourhood and potted them and they didn't fair well.  How might I grow some from scratch (in a pot) and do you have any advice as to how I might feed and take care of them?

Answer
An artist for sure - this would be quite the conversation piece.

Since you've brought it up, I have to wonder why nobody thought of this before.

Someone recently emailed me the latest Fungus jokes.  What do you call a Mushroom that spends the whole day singing and dancing?

[scroll down for the answer...]





A Fun guy.

Speaking of Fun Guys, Mushroom Pundit David Fischer knows everything you ever wanted to know about this Kingdom.  He has a website (http://americanmushrooms.com/basics.htm) devoted to Mushroom farming.  He even sells books and DVDs on the subject.

With respect to your use of the word Toadstools, I quote the Pundit: "The slang term "toadstool" is best avoided, as it is ambiguous: to some people, 'toadstool' implies a poisonous mushroom."  Not everyone, mind you.  Although if you want to discourage visitors from eating the ones on the coffee table, maybe it's not such a bad idea.

There are internet websites that go into great scientific minutiae to explain how to grow Mushrooms.  There are instructions catering to everyone from first grade schoolchildren to advanced university drug dealers at Shroomery webpages (http://www.shroomery.org/4/Grow-Mushrooms) and there is a website for tabletop mushroom gardening at Kitchen Culture (http://www.kitchenculturekit.com/Mushroom/spore.htm).

One thing you will probably have to prepare for is a Terrarium.  As they point out, and I have to agree with them, Mushrooms need humidity.  The kind of moisture in a garden from rain and standing water is what you have to replicate, indoors.  Mushrooms don't have roots.  They have to have water close by, constantly.  Some need total darkness, others need shade, but I don't know any that will grow in full sun for more than a few hours - and they don't need it anyway since there's no photosynthesis going on in their brown little bodies.

This is not unfortunately as simple as buying seeds or bulbs at the garden center, as you'll see.  And as you have also learned, you cannot really transplant these things, as they are quite a different creature from other Plant Kingdoms.

If it was so simple, however, everyone would be doing it.