Responses of soil properties and crop yields to different inorganic and organic amendments in a Swiss conventional farming system

Abstract

In agro-ecosystems, fertilization practices are crucial for sustaining crop productivity. Here, based on a\ud 50-year long-term experiment, we studied the influence of fertilization practices (inorganic and/or\ud organic) and nitrogen (N) application rates on (i) soil physicochemical properties, (ii) microbial and\ud earthworm communities and (iii) crop production. Our results showed that soil organic carbon content\ud was increased by incorporation of crop residues (+2.45%) and farmyard manure application (+6.40%) in\ud comparison to the use of mineral fertilizer alone. In contrast, soil carbon stock was not significantly\ud affected by these fertilization practices. Overall, only farmyard manure application improved soil\ud physicochemical properties compared to mineral fertilization alone. Soil microbial population was\ud enhanced by the application of organic amendments as indicated by microbial biomass and\ud phospholipid-derived fatty acids contents. The fertilization practices and the N application rates\ud affected significantly both the biomass and composition of earthworm populations, especially the epigeic\ud and endogeic species. Finally, farmyard manure application significantly increased crop yield (+3.5%) in\ud comparison to mineral fertilization alone. Crop residue incorporation rendered variable but similar crop\ud yields over the 50-year period. The results of this long-term experiment indicate that the use of organic\ud amendments not only reduces the need for higher amount of mineral N fertilizer but also improves the\ud soil biological properties with direct effects on crop yield

The importance and profitability of farmyard manure application to an organically managed crop rotation

“…According to Körschens et al (1998), the annual changes of the C org content amounted only to about 0.01% C org , even under extreme changes of the fertilizing system. The long-term application of FYM, as a rule, increased the C org content of the soil (Dunjana et al, 2012;Fageria, 2012;Šimon, Czakό, 2014;Blanchet et al, 2016). However, as showed by Scherer et al (2011), after 45 years of repeated applications of FYM (every second year 4.5 and 9.0 t ha -1 on a dry weight basis) the C org content did not significantly differ from the control.…”

“…Microorganisms functioning in the rhizosphere are particularly important for plant nutrition as they provide plants not only with available nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium but also with physiologically active substances that stimulate plant growth. Microorganisms are the most important degraders of organic material in the soil (Bakšienė et al, 2014;Blanchet et al, 2016). In organic systems, plant production depends primarily on nutrient cycling in soils that are controlled by microbes and soil enzymes (Monokrousos et al, 2006).…”

The effects of organic and mineral fertilizers on carbon sequestration, soil properties, and crop yields from a long‐term field experiment under a Swiss conventional farming system

“…A nonsignificant but positive effect of N fertilization ( Min‐N0 vs. Min‐Nopt treatments) was observed on SOC content and consequently on CEC and biological activity. Nitrogen fertilization has been reported to increase C sequestration (Lemke et al, ; Liebig, Varvel, Doran, & Wienhold, ), but the effect differs between studies (Blanchet et al, ; Khan, Mulvaney, Ellsworth, & Boast, ; Maltas et al, ). The application of fertilizers to nutrient deficient soils generally increases SOC content because fertilizers increase crop production and thereby the amount of plant residues released to the soil (Edmeades, ).…”

“…To avoid the interannual variations in crop grain yield, which were often higher than differences between treatments in a given year, a crop yield index was used to compare the results (Morel, Plenchette, & Fardeau, ). Thus, results of grain yields were expressed as a percentage of the control treatment ( Min‐Nopt ) and were named ‘relative grain yields.’ The evolution of relative grain yield was assessed using a simple moving average (SMA) curve (Blanchet, Gavazov, Bragazza, & Sinaj, ). SMA smooths high interannual variations by taking into consideration the current year and the five previous ones to show the evolution of crop yields at the timescale of the crop rotation.…”

Biochar-compost mixture as amendment for improvement of polybag-growing media and oil palm seedlings at main nursery stage

“…Compost, a by-product of organics recycling programme, contains significant amount of humic substances, valuable plant nutrients, and essential trace elements (Donn et al 2014;Bedada et al 2014). It restores soil organic matter which has direct effects on soil microbial biomass and enzyme activities (Ouni et al 2013;Blanchet et al 2016), consequently improving crop growth and yield (D'Hose et al 2014;Ninh et al 2015).…”