Fertilizers Properties Applications and Effects

285 Pages·2008·5.66 MB·English

by  Langdon R. Elsworth

F :
ERTILIZERS
P , A
ROPERTIES PPLICATIONS
AND EFFECTS

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F :
ERTILIZERS
P , A
ROPERTIES PPLICATIONS
AND EFFECTS

LANGDON R. ELSWORTH
AND
WALTER O. PALEY
EDITORS

Nova Science Publishers, Inc.
New York
Copyright © 2009 by Nova Science Publishers, Inc.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Fertilizers : properties, applications and effects / Langdon R. Elsworth and Walter O. Paley (editors).
p. cm.
ISBN 978-1-60741-901-3 (E-Book)
1. Fertilizers. 2. Fertilizers--Application. I. Elsworth, Langdon R. II. Paley, Walter O.
S633.F44 2008
631.8--dc22
2008004102

Published by Nova Science Publishers, Inc. (cid:212) New York
Contents

Preface vii
Chapter I Ecological Fertilization: An Example for Paddy Rice Performed
as a Crop Rotation System in Southern China 1
Zhongyi Yang, Guorong Xin, Jiangang Yuan, Wei Fang
and Guoxi Li
Chapter II Soybean Mineral Nutrition and Biotic Relationships 29
Jeffery D. Ray and Felix B. Fritschi
Chapter III Property of Biodegraded Fish-Meal Wastewater
as a Liquid-Fertilizer 57
Joong Kyun Kim and Geon Lee
Chapter IV Fertilizer Application on Grassland – History, Effects and Scientific
Value of Long-Term Experimentation 83
Michal Hejcman and Jürgen Schellberg
Chapter V Precision Fertilizer Management on Grassland 107
Jürgen Schellberg and Michal Hejcman
Chapter VI Organic Fertilization as Resource for a Sustainable Agriculture 123
Montemurro Francesco and Maiorana Michele
Chapter VII The Present Situation and the Future Improvement of Fertilizer
Applications by Farmers in Rainfed Rice Culture
in Northeast Thailand 147
Koki Homma and Takeshi Horie
Chapter VIII Optimization of N Fertilization Management in Citrus Trees:
15N as a Tool in NUE Improvement Studies 181
Ana Quiñones, Belén Martínez-Alcántara and Francisco Legaz
vi Contents
Chapter IX A New Analytical System for Remotely Monitoring Fertilizer Ions:
The Potentiometric Electronic Tongue 207
Manuel Gutiérrez, Salvador Alegret, Juan Manuel Gutiérrez,
Rafaela Cáceres, Jaume Casadesús, Roberto Muñoz, Oriol Marfà
and Manel del Valle,
Chapter X Organo-Zeolitic-Soil Systems: A New Approach to Plant Nutrition 223
P. J. Leggo and B. Ledésert
Chapter XI Radio-Environmental Impacts of Phosphogypsum 241
Ioannis Pashalidis
Index 251
Preface

Fertilizers are compounds given to plants to promote growth; they are usually applied
either through the soil, for uptake by plant roots, or by foliar feeding, for uptake through
leaves. Fertilizers can be organic (composed of organic matter), or inorganic (made of simple,
inorganic chemicals or minerals). They can be naturally occurring compounds such as peat or
mineral deposits, or manufactured through natural processes (such as composting) or
chemical processes (such as the Haber process).
Fertilizers typically provide, in varying proportions, the three major plant nutrients
(nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium), the secondary plant nutrients (calcium, sulfur,
magnesium), and sometimes trace elements (or micronutrients) with a role in plant nutrition:
boron, chlorine, manganese, iron, zinc, copper, and molybdenum. This new book presents
recent and important research from around the globe.
Chapter I - Degradation of soil fertility under long term application of inorganic
fertilizers is an increasingly serious problem damaging sustainability of modern agriculture.
Ecological fertilization is proposed to solve the problems caused by the current fertilization
in modern intensive agricultural systems. A rice-ryegrass rotation system established in
southern China is a good example of the ecological fertilization practice. The integrative
ecological benefits of the rotation system, particularly in aspects concerning to growth and
yield responses of paddy rice have been investigated since 1990s. It was observed that the
yields of the subsequent paddy rice in many cases were increased for at least 10% in the
rotation system when comparing to those in conventional rice cropping. Physical, chemical
and biological properties of the paddy soil cropped ryegrass in winter were markedly
improved. The evidences of the improvements were observed in availabilities of nutrients,
soil enzymes activities, soil microbial features, slow-releases of nutrients etc.
Agricultural nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) are main contributors of non-point source
pollution to water bodies and often lead to water eutrophication. In the rice - ryegrass rotation
system, compound fertilizers are still applied in both ryegrass and rice cropping processes.
We valuated the environment influences of the applied N and P in the rice - ryegrass rotation
as a model of the ecological fertilization based on the investigation for the patterns of N and
P outflows from the rotation system.
Chapter II - Soybean is the world’s most important source of protein and accounts for
nearly 70% of the world protein meal consumption. This has led to the production of
viii Langdon R. Elsworth and Walter O. Paley
soybean in a wide range of environmental conditions across a huge geographic expanse.
Soybean has a distinct advantage over non-leguminous crops through its ability to acquire N
via symbiotic N-fixation. However, other nutrients are critically important to optimize
soybean production, both through direct effects on growth and development as well as
through their influences on soybean biological N fixation. In this review the authors highlight
the fertility requirements and considerations for soybean production and examine the
relationships between soybean mineral nutrition and biotic factors such as selected disease,
insects, and nematodes.
Chapter III - The amount of fisheries waste generated in Korea is expected to increase
with a steady increase in population to enjoy taste of slices of raw fish. The fisheries waste is
reduced and reutilized through the fish meal production. The process, which uses fish wastes
such as heads, bones or other residues, is the commonest used in the Korean industries. The
first step of the fish-meal manufacturing processes is the compression and crushing of the raw
material, which is then cooked with steam, and the liquid effluent is filtered off in a filter
press. The liquid stream contains oils and a high content of organic suspended solids. After
oil separation, the fish-meal wastewater (FMW) is generated and shipped to wastewater
treatment place. FMW has been customarily disposed of by dumping into the sea, since direct
discharge of FMW can cause serious environmental problems. Besides, bad smell, which is
produced during fish-meal manufacturing processes, causes civil petition. Stricter regulations
for this problem also come into force every year in Korea. Therefore, there is an urge to seek
for an effective treatment to remove the organic load from the FMW; otherwise the fish meal
factories will be forced to shut down.
Biological treatment technologies of fish-processing wastewater have been studied to
improve effluent quality (Battistoni and Fava, 1995; Park et al., 2001). The common feature
of the wastewaters from fish processing is their diluted protein content, which after
concentration by a suitable method would enable the recovery and reuse of this valuable raw
material, either by direct recycling to the process or subsequent use in animal feed, human
food, seasoning, etc. (Afonso and Borquez, 2002). It has been also reported that the organic
wastes contain compounds, which are capable of promoting plant growth (Day and
Katterman, 1992), and seafood processing wastewaters do not contain known toxic or
carcinogenic materials unlike other types of municipal and industrial effluents (Afonso and
Borquez, 2002). Although these studies imply that FMW could be a valuable resource for
agriculture, potential utilization of this fish wastes has been limited because of its bad smell
(Martin, 1999). There is an increasing need to find ecologically acceptable alternatives to
overcome this problem.
Aerobic biodegradation has been widely used in treatment of wastewaters, and recently
references to the use of meso- and thermophilic microorganisms have become increasingly
frequent (Cibis et al., 2006). During the biodegradation, the organic matter is biodegraded
mainly through exothermic aerobic reactions, producing carbon dioxide, water, mineral salts,
and a stable and humified organic material (Ferrer et al., 2001). There have been few reports
that presented the reutilization of biodegraded waste products as liquid-fertilizer: a waste
product of alcoholic fermentation of sugar beet (Agaur and Kadioglu, 1992), diluted manure
streams after biological treatment (Kalyuzhnyi et al., 1999), and biodegraded fish-meal
wastewater in our previous studies (Kim et al, 2007; Kim and Lee, 2008). Therefore, aerobic
Preface ix
biodegradation is considered to be the most suitable alternative to treat FMW and realize a
market for such a waste as a fertilizer.
The growth of plants and their quality are mainly a function of the quantity of fertilizer
and water. So it is very important to improve the utilization of water resources and fertilizer
nutrients. The influence of organic matter on soil biological and physical fertility is well
known. Organic matter affects crop growth and yield either directly by supplying nutrients or
indirectly by modifying soil physical properties such as stability of aggregates and porosity
that can improve the root environment and stimulate plant growth (Darwish et al., 1995).
Incorporation of organic matter has been shown to improve soil properties such as
aggregation, water-holding capacity, hydraulic conductivity, bulk density, the degree of
compaction, fertility and resistance to water and wind erosion (Carter and Stewart, 1996;
Franzluebbers, 2002; Zebarth et al., 1999). Combined use of organic and inorganic sources of
nutrients is essential to maintain soil health and to augment the efficiency of nutrients (Lian,
1994). Three primary nutrients in fertilizers are nitrogen, phosphate, and potassium.
According to Perrenoud’s report (1990), most authors agree that N generally increases crop
susceptibility to pests and diseases, and P and K tend to improve plant health. It has been
reported that tomato is a heavy feeder of NPK (Hebbar et al., 2004) and total nitrogen content
is high in leaves in plants having a high occurrence of bitter fruits (Kano et al., 2001).
Phosphorus is one of the most essential macronutrients (N, P, K, Ca, Mg, S) required for the
growth of plants, and the deficiency of phosphorus will restrict plant growth in soil (Son et
al., 2006). However, the excessive fertilization with chemically synthesized phosphate
fertilizers has caused severe accumulation of insoluble phosphate compounds in farming soil
(Omar, 1998), which gradually deteriorates the quality as well as the pH of soil. Different
fertilization treatments of a long-term field experiment can cause soil macronutrients and
their available concentrations to change, which in turn affects soil micronutrient (Cu, Fe, Mn,
Zn) levels. Application of appropriate rates of N, P and K fertilizers has been reported to be
able to increase soil Cu, Zn and Mn availabilities and the concentrations of Cu, Zn, Fe and
Mn in wheat (Li, et al., 2007). It has been also reported that higher rates of fertilizers
suppress microbial respiration (Thirukkumaran and Parkinson, 2000) and dehydrogenase
activity (Simek et al., 1999). Recently, greater emphasis has been placed on the proper
handling and application of agricultural fertilizers in order to increase crop yield, reduce costs
and minimize environmental pollution (Allaire and Parent, 2004; Tomaszewska and
Jarosiewicz, 2006).
Hydroponics is a plant culture technique, which enables plant growth in a nutrient
solution with the mechanical support of inert substrata (Nhut et al., 2006). Hydroponic
culture systems provide a convenient means of studying plant uptake of nutrients free of
confounding and uncontrollable changes in soil nutrient supply to the roots. Thus, it is fit for
test of fertilizing ability of liquid fertilizers. The technique was developed from experiments
carried out to determine what substances make plants grow and plant composition (Howard,
1993). Water culture was one of the earliest methods of hydroponics used both in laboratory
experiments and in commercial crop production. Nowadays, hydroponics is considered as a
promising technique not only for plant physiology experiments but also for commercial
production (Nhut et al., 2004; Resh, 1993). The technique has been also adapted to many
situations, from field and indoor greenhouse culture to highly specialized culture in atomic