MY FARM Szymon and Karolina Jurkiewicz (PL)
In each edition of “Mushroom Business” we publish an interview with a grower. The emphasis here is on the farm and cultiva- tion methods. This edition offers a portrait of the farm owned by the Jurkiewicz family, situated in Jastrowie in the north west of Poland. We spoke to Szymon Jurkiewicz.
By John Peeters
The grower “I’m actually just starting to get to grips with the farm, and there’s plenty of work ahead. My wife and I bought the farm in May this year. The building is about ten years old and is built like a large shed containing the growing rooms. I think there were origi- nally four growing rooms, which have risen to ten after a number
of expansion projects. When Pri- me Champ Poland was establis- hed in 2010 this farm was already part of the concern, after all our neighbour is Prime Champ’s pac- kaging centre, so it was a logical step to continue. When I took over the farm I also became one of the Prime Champ shareholders. Prior to that I had already worked on other farms in the group, and my experiences were good. It’s ideal for Prime Champ having our farm right next to the packaging centre, we have got used to sup- plying last minute orders and filling any gaps in production. It sounds more hectic than it is. We can easily get a small pallet of mushrooms cool enough to pack in 30 minutes. I also expect Prime Champ to sell all our mushrooms for a reasonable price , and am prepared to do something extra in return. We can expand the farm later on, it’s important to get the farm running smoothly first, and make sure Prime Champ operates well. Up until now it has been going according to plan.”
Pickers at work on the farm of the Jurkiewicz family.
Cultivation The farm run by the Jurkiewicz fa- mily numbers ten growing rooms, each holding 300 square metres of growing surface, equipped with Dutch shelving. Cultivation is currently on a six-week schedule with three flushes. The rooms are filled with a single filling ma- chine, and the spawn run compost is supplied by Kania. The filling weight is 82 kg per square metre, and 12 kg of supplement is ad- ded per ton of compost. After filling, the beds are covered with a five centimetre layer of casing soil from Kartel, a local supplier, and following casing a ruffling machine adds a small amount of compost (CAC). Over the fol- lowing day between 20 and 25 litres of water is sprayed over the beds, and ruffling is normally repeated on day five. After ruf- fling a further one litre of water is applied per square metre. This water contains nematodes to control sciarid larvae. Cool down is started two days after ruffling, and the air temperature is reduced from 22 degrees to 17 degrees at a rate of 0.6 degrees per day, the CO2 is reduced by 200 ppm per day from 7000 to 1200 ppm and the RH drops from 95% at the start to 89-90% at the start of harvesting. The first mushrooms are picked around the 17th day after filling with the first flush lasting about four to five days of picking. To promote good keepability properties, no water is sprayed onto the mushrooms. After the flush, about ten litres of water is distributed over the beds spread over a 20-24 hour period. The second flush is picked over four days, after which four to six litres is sprayed before the third flush. The rooms are steamed be- fore being refilled. The total yield of white mushrooms is 28 kg per square metre, with some 60% har- vested as medium grade and 40% as fine, up to a cap diameter of 40 millimetres. The climate control installation comes from the Polish company Label. Szymon and Ka- rolina Jurkiewicz’s farm employs 30 people, including 23 pickers. All the mushrooms are marketed via Prime Champ Poland. ◗
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