Journal
SUSTAINABILITY
Volume 14, Issue 7, Pages -Publisher
MDPI
DOI: 10.3390/su14074355
Keywords
organic fertilizers; uniformity; granulated meat and bone meal; granulated cattle manure; lime; manure
Funding
- Department of Agricultural Engineering and Safety of the Agriculture Academy of Vytautas Magnus University
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The physical properties of organic fertilizers significantly affect the uniformity of fertilizer distribution. Cattle manure granules are more evenly spread on the soil surface compared to meat and bone meal granules, while dry lime is distributed more uniformly than wet lime.
Precise and environmentally friendly fertilization is one of the most effective agrotechnical measures to improve crop yield, crop quality, and environmental sustainability. The aim of this study was to determine the uniformity of spreading of organic fertilizers on the soil surface at different flows by evaluating the influence of the physical and mechanical properties of the fertilizers. The physical properties of organic fertilizers have been found to have a significant impact on the uniformity of fertilizer distribution. The investigation of fertilizer properties showed that the average moisture content of meat and bone meal granular fertilizers was 8.6 +/- 0.2%, of cattle manure granular fertilizers-14.9 +/- 1.5%, of dry lime-9.4 +/- 0.1%, of wet lime-17.0 +/- 1.1%, and of manure-66.7 +/- 6.9%. It was found that the granules of cattle manure were more evenly spread on the soil surface (Gaussian coefficient 0.46) than the granules of meat and bone meal (g(2) = 7.11). At the same time, manure was found to be most evenly distributed on the soil when dry lime was spread more evenly than wet. Simultaneously, it was revealed that the physical properties of the fertilizer, such as higher moisture, lower mass, granule length, and width, affected the uniformity of fertilizer distribution on the soil surface.
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