Cultivation of oyster mushroom on different agricultural wastes

Abstract

Oyster mushrooms are the best known due to their nutritional value and medicinal properties. In this study, Pleurotus ostreatus was cultivated on pretreated lignocellulosic agricultural wastes comprising of corn cobs, rice straw and ground nut shells. Agricultural waste conserves finite phosphate resources and embedded energy from industrial nitrogen fixation. It is also a way of sustainable food production. A dense white mass of mushroom mycelium colonized the substrate within 17 days of incubation at 300C in dark phase. Subsequently, massive fructification appeared within 50 to 60 days in light phase after spawning. The study was further extended to repeated-harvest and maximum average yield of mushroom obtained was 197.8 g/Kg of dried corn cobs, followed by rice straw and ground nut shells. The yield was drastically reduced after third harvest and not noteworthy, which might be attributed to the exhaustion of nutritional constituents of substrates available for growing mushroom.