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Jaroslaw Piotrowicz with Henk van Gerwen’s cool down diagram. long still?”


In the mid-1980s, regional mushroom growing received a huge impulse thanks to the arrival of Lemany, a composting company that could make far superior compost than the individual growers. But the early 1990s heralded more trying times. The grower: “We were faced by hyper-inflation. Things that cost 100 Zloty one week, cost 1000 Zloty the next. Bills were left unpaid. The market changed too and prices fell considerably. Most of the growers decided to stop at the time. Why didn’t I? Well, contrary to many of my former fellow growers, I had developed a true passion for mushroom growing. I had really caught the bug, so to speak. I still see it as more of a hobby than a job.”


Expansion That hobby has grown in the meantime from a single growing room in front of Piotrowicz’s house in 1981 into a modern operation on the current site, covering around 3300 square metres with a total of 12 growing rooms, five of a good 200 m2 and seven of 312 m2. And there are plans afoot to expand the company again in 2014 with a building housing a total of six growing rooms, each of 630 square metres. The company already won a Pieczary in 2006 – a prize awarded annually by Wokas at the Pieczarkalia, a trade fair held in Siedlce. The farm has held Eurep- GAP/GlobalGAP certification since 2008 and won a local agricultural award in 2009. Jaroslaw Piotrowicz, who runs the farm together with his wife Jola, has been involved in the marketing and trading compa- ny Prime Champ from its foundation as a co-owner. “There are six of us. We try to reach consensus on decisions and strategies in a mature way. We are un- der an obligation to sell all of our production via the organisation. Where others argue about money and volumes, we take the approach of a positive attitude and cooperation.” Piotrowicz ’s farm operates to a six-week cropping cycle of three flushes. Two rooms are filled each week, on Tuesdays and Fridays, using phase III blocks supplied by Lemany, who have also relocated to a site 70 kilometres from the farm. The blocks on Tuesdays are inoculated with Italspawn F 599, and


those on Fridays with Euromycel F 58. During fil- ling the blocks are placed manually on a net that is gradually pulled into the beds. The growing rooms hold a double row of five-tier shelving. After filling, the blocks are loosened and cased the following day using casing soil from Wokas in Irmscher. “I’m happy with my raw materials”, says Piotrowicz, “We mix CAC material through the casing soil before we case, a process we do by hand on Wednesdays and Satur- days, one day after filling. We ruffle manually on day four, using small rakes.” Before ruffling the beds are sprayed with18 to 25 litres of water per square metre.


Van Gerwen Two different types of climate computer can be


found in the two blocks of growing rooms on the farm. Label from Poland and Fancom from the Ne- therlands are both present. A rather remarkable tool is also used during cool down . “Henk van Gerwen visited us many years ago and he jotted down a cool down diagram on a whiteboard”, explains the gro- wer, “and I still use it. Wiping that board is on pain of execution! I have retraced Henk’s original lines many times to stop them fading.” During cool down the air temperature is decreased by 1.2 degrees a day, and the CO2 is lowered from 2800 to 1200 ppm. For quality and keepability reasons, the mushrooms are not sprayed during the first flush. The RH during this flush is around 88% and the CO2 around 1300 ppm. During the flush, the air temperature is slowly incre- ased. After the flush between eight and ten litres of water is applied to the beds in sessions of one litre. The mushrooms are not sprayed during the second flush either. Instead a final application of three to six litres of water per square metre is given after this flush. Piotrowicz: “We try not to use chemicals in the cultivation process, but we do disinfect with chlorine. I employ 30 people, 20 of whom pick the mushrooms. If we do decide to expand, then we will use machi- nes for filling and casing. You can’t reasonably be expected to fill rooms of 600 square metres by hand. Now the only mechanisation we have is a pulling winch that empties the belt.” . ◗


The shelving is filled with blocks of spawn- run compost. Notice the LED lighting above the beds. This allows the mushroom quality to be assessed well.


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