TITLE:
Characterization and Impact of Cattle Manure Particle Size on Physical Properties of Sandy Soils
AUTHORS:
Doaa Ahmed El-Nagar, Ramadan Abd Alaaty Mohamed
KEYWORDS:
Cattle Manure, Size, Soil Properties, Langmuir and Freundlich Sorption Models
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Geoscience and Environment Protection,
Vol.7 No.8,
August
23,
2019
ABSTRACT: Sandy soils have poor physical properties, which
cause them to drain quickly and not hold water well; however, with the addition of cattle manure, sandy soil can be improved.
Therefore, experiments were conducted to investigate the characterization and
impact of different particle sizes of cattle manure (CMS) on improving some
physical properties of sandy soil and thus the yield of lettuce. Cattle manure
was ground to powder and was sieved with three different Particle sizes 4.76-2
(CMS1), 2-0.8 (CMS2), 0.8-0.4 (CMS3) mm. Some physical properties were measured
for different Particle sizes of manure. A batch of sorption experiments was carried out to study
the role of different Particle sizes of manure on adsorption of N, P and K from
aqueous solution. Two experiments were carried out on sandy soil (pots and field)
to study the impact of adding CMS (5 ton/fed) to enhance some physical
properties of sandy soil. The results indicated that the physical properties of cattle
manure changed based on particle size fractionation, where Bulk density and
saturated water holding capacity increased as particle size decreased, while
porosity reduced as particle size decreased. The results of the sorption parameters of N, P and K on different particle sizes of
manure indicated that maximum sorption occurred on CMS 3 for both P and K
according to Langmuir and Freundlich sorption models. Two experiments showed
that CMS had affected significantly the total porosity (TP), bulk density (Bd),
slowly drainable pores (SDP), water holding pores and (WHP) available water
(AW) in comparison to control. The CMS had a slight effect on Quickly-drainable
pores (QDP) and fine capillary pores (FCP) as compared to the control in both
experiments. Fresh weight, dry weight and number of leaf lettuce increased
significantly with decreasing particle sizes of cattle manure as compared to
control.