Evolution of agricultural wastes for the cultivation of edible mushroom Pleurotus eryngii

Abstract

This research studies the possible use of some of Iraq's local agricultural wastes as growth substrates for producing the edible oyster mushroom (Pleurotus eryngii). The biological process of growing and producing edible mushrooms is a bioconversion of organic wastes to bioprotein (mycoprotein). Therefore, this study aims to investigate nine different substrates from plant residues. The three primary substrates are typical viz date palm waste (Phoenix dactylifera), maize cob (Zea mays) and cane (Phragmites communis), with two types of additional enrichment, i.e., rice husks (Oryza sativa) and corn seeds husks (Zea mays), and without further enrichment (control). The experiment was randomly distributed according to Randomized Complete Design (RCD), with three replicates. The less crop cycle period (day) which in Treatments T7 and T8 (30.33, 31.67 days) when T2 (100%Corncobs), T1 (100%Waste of Date palm), T7 (80%Waste of the date palm with 20%Corn husks) and T8 (80% Corncobs with 20%Corn husks) provide the crest mushrooms yield arrived 293.0 280.7, 268.7 and 264.0 g kg-1 substrate respectively. Keywords. Bio protein; lignocelluloses; Mushroom substrates; Oyster mushrooms