Moringa peregrina is a medicinal plant with documented antifungal properties. Given the antifungal activity of the extracts of Moringa against different fungi, we tested the effects of organic and aqueous extracts of seeds of this plant species on mycopathogenic fungus, Mycogone perniciosa, and its host, Agaricus bisporus, the edible button mushroom. We added different concentrations of the extracts to potato dextrose agar media and monitored mycelial growth of M. perniciosa and A. bisporus. Results showed that all the extracts had antifungal activity against both fungi. Organic extract, hexane and chloroform, were more effective to control M. perniciosa, and at 1000 ppm concentration of these extracts, the growth was completely inhibited. Although the organic extracts resulted in growth reduction in A. bisporus, too, this effect was less severe and resulted in 29–31% growth reduction. We then tested the organic extracts on Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. solani, Rhizoctonia solani and Botrytis cinerea as the three phytopathogenic fungi. The mycelial growth of B. cinerea was completely inhibited by the extract, but there was no inhibitory effects on mycelial growth for the other two fungi. Thin layer chromatography revealed four distinct fractions in the hexane extract, from which fraction 3 resulted in reduction in growth of Mycogone. These preliminary in vitro assays suggest that while Moringa organic extracts inhibit mycelial growth of M. perniciosa effectively, they only reduce growth of A. bisporus, promising the extracts as selective biofungicides to be tested in vivo experiments.

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