Assessing the Growth Performance of Paddy Straw Mushroom (Volvariella volvacea (Bull.) Singer 1951) on Locally Available Agro-Wastes

Volvariella volvacea (Bull.) Singer (1951), or paddy straw mushroom, is an edible mushroom cultivated in tropical and subtropical regions. It is usually grown on lignocellulosic agricultural waste as a substrate. Three types of agricultural waste such as paddy straw, sawdust and banana leaves were used as culture substrate to assess the growth performance of Volvariella volvacea. All these wastes were soaked in water for 24 hours, prepared and packaged in plastic bags and then sterilized in an autoclave at 120°C for 1 hour 30 minutes under a pressure of 1 atm. The data were statistically analysed by analysis of variance (ANOVA) at the 5% level with SPSS software to determine if there is a significant difference between the fruiting body diameter, the number of fruiting bodies, the wet weight of fruiting bodies and the biological efficiency of Volvariella volvacea on three different culture media. Cultivation results shown the first harvest at the egg stage occurs 14 days after inoculation for sawdust and paddy straw, and 15 days after inoculation for banana leaves while the first harvest at the mature stage occurs 2 to 3 days after that of the egg stage for each substrate. The results also show that among the 3 substrates used for the cultivation of V. volvacea, sawdust recorded the best results in terms of number of fruiting bodies (8), fresh weight (36.7 g), diameter of fruiting body (2.57 cm) and biological efficiency (12.63%). Statistical analysis (p < 0.05) showed no significant difference in these parameters among different substrates. These results demonstrate that V. volvacea shows good growth performance on sawdust and paddy straw but this performance could certainly be improved on composted substrates with higher yields, opening prospects for large-scale cultivation for commercial purposes.