Journal of Environmental Biology

Comparative evaluation of five Pleurotus species for their growth behaviour and yield performance using wheat straw as a substrate

Somnath Kadappa Holkar¹* and Ram Chandra²

¹Division of Crop Protection, Indian Institute of Sugarcane Research, Lucknow-226 002, India

²Department of Mycology and Plant Pathology, Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi - 221 005, India

*Corresponding Author E-mail : somnathk_holkar@yahoo.com

 Publication Data

Paper received:

22 August 2014

Revised received:

22 January 2015

Accepted:

20 March 2015

Abstract

Pleurotus spp. is one of the most important edible mushrooms cultivated in India. The present study was an attempt to compare five Pleurotus species in context of actual time required for each growth stage viz., spawn run period, number of days required for initiation of pin heads of sporophores, average weight of fruiting bodies in all the flushes and total yield. The spawn run period in all the five species were recorded between 18 days-21 days, similarly for initiation of pinheads 5 days -7 days were required after spawn run period. A total of 24 days to 27 days, 34 days to 37 days and 47 days to 53 days were required for harvesting the I, II and III flushes respectively. An average number of 41 to 70 sporophores per bag containing 1 kg of dry substrates were obtained from all the Pleurotus species. Maximum 14 g weight of single sporophore was recorded from P. florida, similarly, an average maximum diameter of 5.3 cm of sporophores of P. florida was observed whereas the diameter of sporophores in rest of the species ranged from 3.0 cm to 3.2 cm. The number of sporophores were obtained from P. sajor-caju (n-70) and all the species showed significant difference with respect to the number of sporophores in a bunch at probability level of P=0.05. Maximum weight of single bunch was recorded (58 g) in P. florida and total yield of 740 gkg^-1 of dry matter was recorded in P. florida.   

 Key words

Oyster mushroom, Physiological parameters, Pleurotus spp., Wheat straw, Yield performance

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