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Covered storage reduces losses and improves crop utilisation of nitrogen from solid cattle manure

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Abstract

A 2-year study was carried out to examine the effects of solid cattle manure storage method on (1) total carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) losses, (2) first-year and residual manure dry matter (DM) and N disappearance after litterbag placement on grassland, and (3) apparent herbage N recovery (ANR) after a single surface application to a sandy grassland field. About twelve tonnes of fresh (FRE) manure taken from a litter barn were stored per treatment as stockpiled (STO), composted (COM) and covered (COV) heaps for 130 days, and total C and N losses were estimated. Thereafter, patterns of DM and N disappearance from FRE, COM and COV manures were monitored using litterbags with three mesh sizes (45 μm, 1 mm and 4 mm). Herbage ANR from these manures was measured at application rates of 200, 400 and 600 kg N ha−1. During the storage period, only about 10 % of the initial Ntotal was lost from the COV heap, whereas these losses were 31 % from the STO heap and 46 % from the COM heap. The respective Ctotal losses were 17, 59 and 67 %. After field placement, overall manure DM and N disappearance rates from all mesh sizes of the litterbags were in the order: COV > FRE > COM (P < 0.05). Independent of N application rate, total herbage ANR was the highest from COV and the lowest from COM manure over two growing seasons (23 vs. 14 %; P < 0.05). Including the N losses during storage, an almost three times higher herbage ANR (20 vs. 7 %) of the manure N taken from the barn was observed by using COV versus COM manure. In case of FRE manure this ANR fraction was 17 %. It is concluded that COV storage reduced storage C and N losses to a minimum. After field application, manure stored under this method decomposed faster and more N was available for plant uptake, especially when compared to COM manure.

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Acknowledgments

This work was financed by the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan. We are equally indebted to Wageningen University for providing technical assistance for this project. We thank Ghulam Abbas Shah, Nicolas Pugeaux, Muhammad Imtiaz Rashid and Crouigneau Pierre for their help in the field work, and Hennie Halm for providing assistance in the laboratory work. Special thanks are due to Johannes Scholberg for critically reading the manuscript. The authors acknowledge the positive comments of two anonymous reviewers which improved the quality of manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Farming Systems Ecology Group, Wageningen University, P.O. Box 563, 6700 AN, Wageningen, The Netherlands

    G. M. Shah, J. C. J. Groot & E. A. Lantinga

  2. Department of Soil Quality, Wageningen University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA, Wageningen, The Netherlands

    O. Oenema

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  1. G. M. Shah
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  2. J. C. J. Groot
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  3. O. Oenema
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  4. E. A. Lantinga
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Correspondence to G. M. Shah.

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Shah, G.M., Groot, J.C.J., Oenema, O. et al. Covered storage reduces losses and improves crop utilisation of nitrogen from solid cattle manure. Nutr Cycl Agroecosyst 94, 299–312 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10705-012-9543-8

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