Specialty mushroom kits are spawning in popularity. More fungi lovers are growing them at home through d.i.y. kits that involve spray-and-grow boxes, oak logs, or sawdust to sprinkle into spots, writes Kate Morgan for The Washington Post.  

Specialty mushroom sales have risen by 32 percent in the past year, writes Morgan. Avondale-based American Mushroom Institute is tuned in to the trend.  

“We say mushrooms are having a movement,” said Lori Harrison V.P. of communication of the institute. Harrison attributes this fungi craze to people looking for more affordable meat substitutes.  

Harrison believes that the boom could offer educational benefits for the at-home gardener. She believes that these at-home kits could increase appreciation and awareness for fungi.  

Many mushroom lovers may not be aware that Chester County is responsible for more than half of the nation’s commercially grown mushrooms. 

“They’re done in these sort of nondescript cinder-block buildings, and you probably don’t pay attention to them,” Harrison said.  

“Comparatively, you drive through any piece of land, basically anywhere in the U.S., and you can see corn growing. You can see apple trees, so you kind of make that connection. There’s a mystique around mushrooms; they just show up in the grocery store.” 

Read more about the boom in popularity of specialty mushrooms in The Washington Post.  

Meghan Klotzbach gives a tour of a mushroom farm in Landenberg.