The paddy straw must be carefully selected. It should be brittle, yellow or golden brown in colour and not older than 6 months. The straw should be dried in the sun for several days, stored if necessary in an air-tight container and used within two months. The ratio of paddy straw to mushroom spawn should be 1 kg "prepared" straw to 4% spawn. Procedure: First the straw must be prepared. The straw should be cut to 3-5 cm pieces. It should then be filled in cloth bags and soaked in water (1 kg straw to 10 litres water) for 10 hours. The straw should be weighted down in the water so that no part of it remains above the level of water. The next stage is pasteurization. Water must be boiled to a temperature of 80 to 85oC. When bubbles appear, the soaked straw, surrounded by the cloth bags, should be weighted down and fully immersed in water. The bubbles will disappear when the straw is immersed and then reappear. Thirty minutes after the reappearance of bubbles the straw should be removed. It should be drained of water and cooled at room temperature, then spread out on a clean surface and dried for two hours. The moisture content of the straw should not exceed 60%. To judge the moisture content one should hold some straw between one's fingers and squeeze tightly. If only one drop of water comes out, then the moisture content is correct. Polythene or polypropylene bags are now required to fill the straw into. The bags should be approximately 35 x 50 cm and should weigh 150 gms each. Before using them, they should be washed with savlon or dettol or formalin. Four strings should be tied together at one end which should be placed at the bottom of the bag. The four free ends must be held outside the bag. The bag can now be filled. First a 5 cm layer of straw should be put in and the straw pressed lightly against the bottom. Mushroom spawn should then be spread over it. Then another 10 cm layer of straw, over which the spawn should be spread and so on till one reaches the top of the bag. Finally it must be covered with a final 5 cm layer of straw, and the four pieces of string and the bag must be tied together. The bags can either be kept on the ground or hung in the room. Hanging them enables one to get at the mushrooms from the bottom of the bag easily.