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Abstract: It has been known in mushroom cultivation for over two hundred years that "casing" of compost with a suitable material was essential to induce the development of fruitbodies (Atkins, 1973; Edwards, 1974; Hayes and Nair, 1975; Nair, 1976; Stoller, 1979; Yeo and Hayes, 1979). Various materials are used for casing throughout the world and appear to give satisfactory results. The casing material has changed radically in the past twenty years. An unsterilized or unpasteurized loam top soil was originally used. More recently, the soil is pasteurized or treated chemically. In the united States several mushroom growers use a loam top soil. Soil is not used in France, instead soft marl dug out of quarries is pulverised and used for casing. A Swiss farm uses a mixture of soil, weathered spent compost and ground tuff which is removed from the mushroom growing trays, stored for one year, pasteurized and re-used. In England peat is mixed with ground chalk and used for casing. The Dutch casing soil consists of a mixture of non-fibrous peat, sphagnum peat, sand and marl. Australian mushroom growers normally use imported peat moss for casing mushroom beds. This material has become very expensive and, depending on the size of the mushroom farm, each grower spends between A$ 20,000 and $ 150,000 each year to purchase imported peat moss. We are, therefore, testing different materials available in Australia for the purpose of casing mushroom beds. Particular attention is given to the possibility of recycling industrial and agricultural waste materials. Apart from physical and chemical characteristics, cost of production and continuity of supply of these materials are of prime importance in the successful application and acceptance by the growers. This paper describes the various Australian resources and their comparative performance as casing materials in mushroom cultivation.
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