Pennsylvania leads the nation in the production of mushrooms. Mushrooms have an economic impact of $1.3 billion and employs some 9,400 people in the state.

During this Pennsylvania Farm Show week, Gale Ferranto, Committee Member of the Mushroom Farmers of Pennsylvania and President of Buona Foods, joined us on The Spark Tuesday to discuss Pennsylvania mushrooms, "Most of our farmers are fourth, fifth generation, some sixth generation family farms in Chester County, Berks County. But I think what made it unique initially and yes, you can grow them in other parts of the country, but you need a certain ag byproduct for the growing material, the growing medium. I mean, growing mushrooms is very scientific at this point. You need horse bedding, you need straw, you need cocoa hulls, so you need certain ag byproducts. We take the recycled materials from other ag byproducts and that's part of our growing medium in our growing rooms. So not everywhere had horse compost, but straw bedding. But we did here in the Northeast because when things started to really ramp up, there were a lot of racetracks in Pennsylvania. So I think that's what made it, you didn't have far to go with transportation. So, I think they were pretty smart back in the early thirties, forties and fifties to say, let's keep it local because we don't have to go too far. We didn't have the transportation. But then as things grew on, refrigeration, we could take the hauling of the fresh mushrooms and we could start to go from Boston down to Florida. So, technology really has helped accelerate our industry.

<a href="https://www.americanmushroom.org/mfpa/the-pa-mushroom-industry/">Pennsylvania leads the nation in the production of mushrooms.</a> Mushrooms have an economic impact of $1.3 billion and employs some 9,400 people in the state.
During this Pennsylvania Farm Show week, Gale Ferranto, Committee Member of the Mushroom Farmers of Pennsylvania and President of Buona Foods, joined us on The Spark Tuesday to discuss Pennsylvania mushrooms, "Most of our farmers are fourth, fifth generation, some sixth generation family farms in Chester County, Berks County. But I think what made it unique initially and yes, you can grow them in other parts of the country, but you need a certain ag byproduct for the growing material, the growing medium. I mean, growing mushrooms is very scientific at this point. You need horse bedding, you need straw, you need cocoa hulls, so you need certain ag byproducts. We take the recycled materials from other ag byproducts and that's part of our growing medium in our growing rooms. So not everywhere had horse compost, but straw bedding. But we did here in the Northeast because when things started to really ramp up, there were a lot of racetracks in Pennsylvania. So I think that's what made it, you didn't have far to go with transportation. So, I think they were pretty smart back in the early thirties, forties and fifties to say, let's keep it local because we don't have to go too far. We didn't have the transportation. But then as things grew on, refrigeration, we could take the hauling of the fresh mushrooms and we could start to go from Boston down to Florida. So, technology really has helped accelerate our industry.

When people come together and talk about really interesting topics, great questions spark better understanding and opportunities for new ideas to form. On The Spark from WITF, hosts Scott LaMar and Aniya Faulcon start the conversations about what’s happening in the world and at home. Share your ideas at https://witf.org/programs/the-spark.

When people come together and talk about really interesting topics, great questions spark better understanding and opportunities for new ideas to form. On The Spark from <a href="https://www.witf.org">WITF</a>, hosts Scott LaMar and Aniya Faulcon start the conversations about what’s happening in the world and at home. Share your ideas at <a href="https://witf.org/programs/the-spark">https://witf.org/programs/the-spark</a>.

The Spark

When people come together and talk about really interesting topics, great questions spark better understanding and opportunities for new ideas to form. On The Spark from WITF, hosts Scott LaMar and Aniya Faulcon start the conversations about what’s happening in the world and at home. Share your ideas at <a href="https://witf.org/programs/the-spark">https://witf.org/programs/the-spark</a>.

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