Our farm has two large fields. When we moved here they were hayfields —not the kind that produce hay for livestock feed, but rather mulch hay. I wasn’t sure what mulch hay was, so I did some investigating.
Mulch hay is not of a high enough quality for feeding livestock. It’s made from overgrown, weedy, or lower-nutrient grasses and plants. It can be used to suppress weeds and retain soil moisture, but around here it is used to support the mushroom industry. Yes, the mushroom industry.
It ends up that Pennsylvania is actually the mushroom capital of the U.S., producing more mushrooms than any other state. The industry is concentrated in Chester County, where farms produce over 60% of the America’s mushrooms.
Mushroom farms use mulch hay as a base material for creating substrates—the growing medium where mushrooms develop.
So farmers around here grow this low-grade hay for mushroom farms, which use it to grow the fruiting body of a fungus. Mulch hay is cut, dried, and compacted into large bales much like regular hay, but instead of being used for livestock feed, it serves as a fibrous, carbon-rich base for white buttons, creminis, and portobellos.
As the new owners we will not continue producing mulch hay. Job number one is to improve our soil health and design a vineyard using a philosophy and approach to land management known as regenerative agriculture.