The effect of calcium chloride irrigation on Agaricus mushroom yield and quality.
Riahi. H, Khamber. H
5th International Postharvest Symposium . Volume of Abstract . Verona, Italy 6-11 June 2004, p.89
2004
บทคัดย่อ
The effect of calcium chloride irrigation on Agaricus mushroom yield and quality.
It has been demonstrated by many workers that varying concentrations of calcium chloride, added to irrigation water, improve the quality of fresh and canned mushrooms.Addition of calcium chloride to irrigation water on mushroom yield, quality, shelf life, dry matter, bacterial population and Ec of casing soil was studied.Each room was divided into two batches (right and left) with the same number of bags.Those bags in right side were irrigated with calcium chloride where as in left side watering was carried out with tap water.Calcium chloride was added to the irrigation water at the time of pin formation in concentration of 0.2%, 0.25% and 0.30%.The result of this study revealed that irrigation of calcium chloride increased the yield significantly.The quality, color, dry matter and shelf life was improved in all treatments.Analysis of the mushrooms for calcium shows a clear increase of the calcium contents.Bacterial population incausing soil and mushroom cap was significantly reduced in all the treatments compare to control.The evidences suggested that post harvest deterioration is directly related to the initial microbial population.Decrease in bacterial population could have a significant effect on shelf life and quality of mushroom.In later flushes very less number of disease were observed when CaCl2 added to irrigation water.This was very much obvious in case of bacterial blotch disease.The salinity is the proportion of potassium and sodium ions to those of calcium.An excess of sodium and potassium ions in casing soil causes reduction of mushroom yield that can be counteracted by adding calcium compounds.
It has been suggested that calcium ions may prevent any possible harmful effects from an excess of other cations, like sodium, potassium and magnesium.