Abstract
Incubations at 5, 10 or 20°C of composted chicken manure in a sand, clay or loam soil consistently released nitrogen. A statistical model fitted to the data confirmed that the temperature dependence followed an Arrhenius pattern. The data were used to test the hypothesis that composted manure behaves more like native soil organic matter than fresh residues and this idea is illustrated with the use of a computer simulation model. Extrapolation of the model results in several climates suggests that about 40% of the organic N in composted chicken manure becomes available to crops during the first year and 6–12% during each subsequent year.
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Acknowledgements
Rothamsted Research in grant-aided by the UK Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council. The author is grateful to the Lawes Agricultural Trust for funding, and Landcare Research in New Zealand for hosting, a period of study leave between December 2005 and May 2006 and also gratefully acknowledges the technical assistance of Henk Niers. Part of this research was carried out while the author was employed at what has now become Plant Research International. This article is dedicated to the memory of Remmie Booij.
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Whitmore, A.P. Determination of the mineralization of nitrogen from composted chicken manure as affected by temperature. Nutr Cycl Agroecosyst 77, 225–232 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10705-006-9059-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10705-006-9059-1