Upgrading of Raw Wheat Straw Applying Fungal Treatment

Abstract

The goal of this research was to improve the nutritive value of local wheat straw (WS) through treatment with fungi Pleurotus and to determine the nutrients digestibility using DaisyII technique. Results showed that fungal treated WS had more (P < 0.05) levels of dry matter (DM), ash and phosphorus (P) compared to the untreated WS. Moreover, fungal treatment had significant effect on reduction (P < 0.05) of crude fiber, acid detergent fiber (ADF) and neutral detergent fiber (NDF), and resulted in significant increase (P < 0.05) in crude protein (CP) content. Fungal treatment increased digestibility of DM, CP, NDF, ADF and gross energy (GE) by 12%, 27%, 28%, 2% and 12%, respectively. It can be concluded that fungal treatment has an advantage in upgrading raw WS.