The U.S. Department of Agriculture gave a 950,000 dollar grant to researchers of Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences to develop a suite of organic management options for three of the most challenging mushroom pests.
Mushroom growers in the United States produced more than 90 million pounds of certified organic mushrooms in 2016, a nearly 50 percent increase over the previous year. The lack of effective integrated pest management however is impeding progress in organic mushroom farming.
And in addition to fungi, mushrooms are susceptible to two dipteran fly species; the sciarid fungus gnat (Lycoriella mali) and the mushroom phorid (Megaselia halterata).
According to news.psu, project outcomes should provide organic growers with tools, techniques and strategies to increase production yield and quality.
