Growing abalone mushrooms on coconut fiber dust

The technique of abalone mushroom cultivation on coconut fiber is applied at Tac Cau islet (An Binh commune, Chau Thanh district, Kien Giang province) since the beginning of 2006. This technique not only contributes to solving fiber dust situation. Coconut pollutes the environment but also brings significant income, improving people's lives. Model of abalone mushroom cultivation on coconut fiber dust is being replicated.

Abalone mushroom is an easy-to-grow mushroom species with high yield, good quality and many valuable properties. In terms of nutritional composition, abalone mushroom has more sugar than both straw mushroom, mushroom, and shiitake mushroom. Abalone mushroom does not lose the above fungi in terms of protein and mineral content. In terms of energy, abalone mushrooms provide energy at a minimum, lower than shiitake mushrooms, equivalent to mushrooms and fat mushrooms, which are suitable for dieters. In addition, the results of the researchers showed that in abalone mushroom, there was antibiotic Pleurotin, inhibiting the activity of positive gram bacteria. The abalone mushroom also contains 2 polysaccharite with anticancer activity, and also contains a lot of folic acid, very necessary for people with anemia.

In our country, abalone mushroom mainly grows wild and has many names: oyster mushroom, white mushroom (according to the northern way of calling), chewy mushroom (according to the way of calling the South). Abalone mushrooms belong to heterotrophic fungi group, live saprophytic, destroy wood and sugar. Cultivated in Vietnam for about 20 years, on many different sources of raw materials, abalone mushroom has always developed well. According to research results from many local functional sectors, abalone mushrooms grown on rice straw, bagasse, sawdust . have achieved biological efficiency (fresh mushrooms on the weight of dry materials) are high.

Abalone mushroom (Photo: Thanh Nhan)

In Kien Giang, after one year of experimentation, it was found that abalone mushroom grown on coconut coir has good results. Agriculture sector in Chau Thanh district, Kien Giang province has produced 1,000 bags of embryos, trained 20 farmers and organized a workshop to test the results of application of techniques for planting abalone mushroom on coconut fiber in 5 farmers . Starting from embryos, farmers will receive the technical process of taking care and watering mushrooms. During this time, the air temperature and humidity in the house are kept stable by continuous watering and spraying (about 4-6 times / day). Harvesting time is 7-10 days / batch, each harvest is 3-4 times. Monitoring of economic and technical indicators, if applied well to the technical stage, productivity and yield will bring high economic efficiency.

In the process of applying abalone mushroom technology on coir dust in Chau Thanh district, the Provincial Center for Advancement of Science, Technology and Technology directly instructed the technical process for farmers. However, due to the first time receiving the new technical process, farmers also overlooked some stages such as pasteurization, encapsulation, transplanting, . so the rate of fungal infection is still high. In 1,000 embryos, there are 828 bags for mushrooms with a total amount of 124 kg, the average yield of 150g mushrooms / bag. Mr. Nguyen Van Khoe and Huynh Duc Tai households have the highest yield of 175-200g mushrooms / bags of embryos. The lowest is Mr. Lam Van Danh, only 30g of mushroom / bag. Particularly, about 10% of embryos in 2 households Huynh Duc Tai and Nguyen Van Kho give high productivity of about 250-300g mushrooms / bags.

The life cycle of abalone mushroom is similar to that of other fungi, starting with the guarantee of a spore, germination of the nutritional fiber system and finally the mushroom ear; Mushroom ears produce spores and the cycle continues. The fruit of abalone mushroom grows through many stages. Based on the mushroom ear shape, there is a name for each stage: coral form, drumstick form, funnel shape, hemispherical form, water hyacinth. From the funnel phase to the hemispherical shift, there is a change in quality, and from the period of semi-deviation to leaf form there is a sharp increase in quantity. Therefore, picking abalone mushroom should be selected when the ear fungus has just turned into leaf form.

In addition to nutritional factors, the environment greatly affects the growth and development of fungi such as temperature, humidity, light, ventilation . Due to the strong and diverse hydro-enzymatic system, Abalone mushroom has the ability to use hydratcarbon, especially cellulose. Abalone mushroom is one of the few species that can use lignin source, especially during the first time of creating fruiting bodies. The fungus has the common characteristic of a funnel-shaped mushroom-ear fungus, round stalk. The bottom of the mushroom cap has many flat plates, aligned with the body, carrying spores that stretch down to the feet, the stalks near the root with fine fine hairs. These plates are the sub-layer of fungi. The top of the mushroom cap is usually slightly concave in the middle, with different colors depending on the type of fungus and the age of the mushroom. Young mushroom ears are dark in color, slightly dark but when mature, color becomes brighter.

Cultivating engineer Nguyen Thi Thanh Van, Head of Agriculture-Forestry-Fishery Department in Chau Thanh district, Kien Giang province, said: 'Growing abalone mushroom on coconut fiber not only contributes to solving environmental pollution at The locality is caused by coconut coir dust, which also contributes to increasing people's income from taking advantage of abandoned vacant land around the house. From 1 bag of embryos (weight of about 1-1.2 kg), if taken care of according to the process, it can produce 250-300g of abalone mushroom products'. Investment cost for 1kg of abalone mushroom is from 6-7 thousand VND. Mushroom products sell from 12-15 thousand VND / kg, producers can earn 6-8 thousand VND / kg. Thus with 10,000 bags of coconut coir dust can produce 2,000 kg of abalone mushrooms and profit of 12-16 million.

The replication of abalone mushroom production process on the coconut coir substrate in Chau Thanh district helps to create new products for the locality, providing more nutritious food sources. On the other hand, with the ability to develop and replicate many farmer households in the coming time, the implementation of the topic also helps to utilize the labor resources at leisure time, increasing the income for households from using agricultural by-products.

A LIFE