A SURVEY OF THE NATURAL OCCURRENCE OF FUSARIUM TOXINS IN WHEAT GROWN IN A SOUTHWESTERN AREA OF GERMANY

Wheat for feed use (84 samples) was collected after harvest from 79 farms in a southwestern part of Germany (Baden-Wuerttemberg). The 1987 crop year was characterized by heavy rainfall in the summer months. The internal mycoflora of wheat samples was primarily fusaria, and storage fungi were rarely present. The Fusarium toxins, zearalenone (ZON), alpha- and beta-zearalenol (alpha,beta-ZOL), deoxynivalenol (DON), 3-acetyldeoxynivalenol (3-AcDON), nivalenol (NIV), T-2 Toxin (T-2), HT-2 toxin (HT-2) and diacetoxyscirpenol (DAS) were analysed by gas chromatography with mass selective detection (detection limit: 1-3 mug/kg). Each of the samples contained at least one of the Fusarium toxins examined except DAS. DON, ZON, 3-AcDON, NIV, T-2, HT-2 and alpha-ZOL were detected in 96%, 80%, 59%, 26%, 26%, 7% and 5% of samples, with an average of 1632, 178, 7, 9, 82, 10 and 23 mug/kg, and a maximum of 20538, 8036, 18, 32, 249, 20 and 71 mug/kg, respectively. beta-ZOL (12 mug/kg) was found in one sample with alpha-ZOL (71 mug/kg). One, two, three, four, five and six Fusarium toxins were detected in 6%, 27%, 37%, 23%, 4%, and 4% of total samples, respectively. The most frequent combination was that of ZON with DON and 3-AcDON, followed by the combinations ZON/DON and ZON/DON/3-AcDON/NIV in 22, 20, and 11% of total samples, respectively.