Physico-chemical properties and associated active microbes of tea garden waste of Golaghat district of Assam, India

Abstract

Tea Gardens generally produce two kinds of waste materials such as Tea Factory waste (TFW) and Pruning Litter (PL). Minimum 2 % of TFW is produced as by - product during processing of tea contributing a huge quantity as waste material.Similarly during pruning operations considerable amount of biomass are produced. Both the bio-waste materials can be managed by biological process to produce value added organic supplement to enrich the soil of tea plantation. During the present study different physico-chemical properties, viz. pH, P2O2 , K2O and nitrogen’s of TFW were analyzed. In TFW the value of Total soluble solids ranged (27.2-31.1%) and Crude fiber ranged (25.83-31.12%) and Caffenine amount ranged (23.14- 27.94%) and Total ash ranged (3.15-6.54%) The aflavin ranged (0.45-0.76%) and the arubignins ranged (18.45-21.32%). In TFW and PL some beneficial and active microbial populations are found which can be used in tea plants after making value added compost to increase their natural productivity. In this study focus was given to explore the beneficial and active microorganisms found in TFW and PL and found some beneficial microbes such as Actinomycetes, Azotobacter, Azospirillum and Phosphate solubilizing bacteria respectively

Earthworm (Oligochaeta) diversity of Kumaun Himalaya with a new record of Drawida japonica (Michaelsen, 1892) (Monaligastridae) from Nainital, Uttarakhand, India

“…Drawida japonica belongs to family Moniligastridae has been reported for the first time from the Kumaun region, and for a second time from Uttarakhand. All the other species were reported previously by various authors including: Mubeen & Hatti (2018); Rajwar et al (Rajwar et al 2018(Rajwar et al , 2022; Bora et al (2021a,b); Saikia et al (2021); Ahmad et al (2022); Khan (2022). Drawida japonica was reported from high-altitude cultivated land and orchards, i.e., 1400 m; therefore, it is assumed that it could be present in other parts of the Himalayan mountains with similar geoclimatic conditions and it is possible that this species might also be available in other parts of the Himalaya besides the studied region due to similarity in biomes.…”

Diversity of earthworm (Lumbricidae) in India: A review

“…The report provided an update with the total 8 number of earthworm species, from the 4 different families. Out of which one species of earthworm is found in the family Lumbricidae which were named as Octolasion tyrtaeum (Savigny, 1826) [22] .…”

Earthworm population and Community structure with reference to Soil ecological parameters from different agroecosystem in Cuddalore district, Tamil Nadu, India

“…Earthworms are well-known worldwide, including in India, for their significant role in the recycling of organic waste (Saikia et al, 2021). Population dynamics, diversity, distribution and community structure in natural ecosystems of the tropics and sub-tropics have received considerable attention in recent years (Fragoso & Lavelle, 1992;Chaudhuri & Singh, 2014).…”