damn, I was scared to look... fear of spoilers...

anyway, from ear-tweak

The final anime episode aired on September 13, 2004 in Japan, for a total of 167 episodes for its original run. This episode covered material from the manga in chapters 345-356 (volume 35-36), roughly, with a few changes here and there.

So i'd recomend starting at volume 30 to get the hang of stuff, anyways, the main diffrence is the introduction of moryamaru (Naraku-made demon) and it's connection to the guy with the jar on his hand.
hey, it's been 200 chapters, how am I' supposed to remember the correct spelling?