Quality assessment of compost produced from cotton stalks and rice straw

Abstract

It is necessary to exploit the organic waste, whether it is vegetable from the farm's waste that were plentiful and legume residues after harvesting the crop. As well as the use of animal waste represented in animal dung, whether solid or liquid. All these wastes are valuable to be used to produce organic fertilizers which could compensate for the depletion of nutrients by crops. Thus, it is possible to maintain soil fertility, maintaining the environment and its cleanliness. This research was done by making 54 piles (2×3×3×3 replicates) in several layers at site area of about 100 cm (width) × 70, 90, 110 cm (height) × 100 cm (length). Rice straw and cotton stalks were air dried and chopped to 0.5-5 cm by a chopping machine before compost preparation, in addition, animals' manure has been inoculants to rapid the compost process. The samples were collected in three periods, after 21, 42, and 63 days. The samples were prepared, and different characteristics were analyzed. The statistical analyses of the obtained results showed that the best treatment was compost produced from rice straw at 42 days from 110 cm covered piles, which has a C/N ratio of 20.