INFLUENCE OF DIFFERENT CASING MATERIALS ON THE GROWTH AND YIELD OF THERMO-TOLERANT STRAINS OF AGARICUS BITORQUIS

Abstract

This study include five casing materials i.e., T_{1 -} Spent Mushroom Compost (SMC), T_{2 -} Sand (S), T_{3 -} Canal Basin Soil (CBS), T_{4 -} well decomposed farm yard manure (FYM) and T_{5 -} Local peat soil (Peat), which were evaluated for their suitability as casing material for button mushroom (Agaricus bitorquis) cultivation, and two strains, UA-65 and W-20, of Agaricus bitorquis which were evaluated for earliness and high yield. The results of different treatments differ significantly. Quantitative production parameters i.e., Data regarding mycelial growth, response time to primordia formation, response time of primordia to reach at biological maturity, number of pinheads, number of fruit bodies, time taken to reach at picking stage after spawning, yield in each strain and biological efficiency, were evaluated. It was observed that T₅ proved best casing material in almost all parameters considered in this experiment while in case of strains for vegetative phase of growth UA-65 (V₁) proved better but W-20 (V₂) gave early and high yields. The greatest proportion of harvested mushrooms was of medium size for both strains and casing layers considered. Results were considered for said quantitative parameters and were significant among the casing layer types.