IMPROVING SANDY SOIL PROPERTIES BY USING FERTILIZER PELLETS MADE FROM AGRICULTURE WASTES

Eidarous, Mohamed; Hassanein, Amro; Mady, Mohamed A.; Marzouk, Ezzat R.

doi:10.21608/sinjas.2022.103725.1063

IMPROVING SANDY SOIL PROPERTIES BY USING FERTILIZER PELLETS MADE FROM AGRICULTURE WASTES

Authors

¹ Dept. Soil and Water, Fac. Environ. Agric. Sci., Arish Univ., 45516, Egypt.

² Dept. Environ. Sci. and Technol., College Agric. and Natural Resources, Univ. Maryland, USA.

³ Dept. Agric. Eng., Fac. Agric., Suez Canal Univ., Egypt.

10.21608/sinjas.2022.103725.1063

Abstract

Five products for fertilizer pellets made from the olive pomace (OP), biochar (Bp), bonechar (Bb) and some additives like zinc oxide nanoparticles (ZnONPs) with pellets diameters 5mm and 10 mm have been studied. Samples have been manufactured and tested on sandy soils. Results showed that pellets with 10 mm disintegrate after 24 hours while the pellets with of 5 mm were more stable for longer time. According to the SEM test, the chemical composition of tested OP pellets of diameters 5 mm for C, N and O contents were 47.5%, 16.3% and 33.1% and 49.8%, 17.0% and 32.6% for outer and inner sphere, respectively. At the column experiment, the increasing pH after addition of pellets mixed with biochar due to the low buffering capacity of the sandy soil used. No salt accumulation was observed in any treatments after pellets application, and EC values remained in the appropriate range for some plant growth. Measuring the bulk density after pellets addition to the soil column at the end of the incubation, the average values of bulk density were 1.49 (control), 1.48 (OP), 1.45 (OP+Bp), 1.44 (OP+Bb), 1.46 (OP+Bp+Bb), and 1.43 (OP_Bp+Bb+ZnONP) g cm^-3. the benefit of converting the amended organic fertilizers to be pellets is to prevent the immigration of organic pellets through the soil column.

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