Keratinolytic fungi in Egyptian soils. I. Baited with hair and wool

150 soil samples were collected, 90 from Nile Valley and Delta, 36 from desert and 24 from salt marshes. Human, buffalo and cow hair and sheep wool were used as baits at three incubation temperatures. Forty-four species which belong to twenty-one genera at 27 degrees C and forty-two which belong to twenty-two genera at 37 degrees C were collected. We isolated the following keratinophilic fungi Chrysosporium tropicum, C. keratinophilum, C. indicum, C. pannicola, C. queenslandicum, Trichophyton terrestre, T. mentagrophytes and Microsporum gypseum. Several other saprophytic fungi were isolated. No fungi were isolated at 45 degrees C.