15N labelling of cattle manure reveals the distribution of organic fertiliser nitrogen in a winter wheat system
Introduction
Livestock manure contains rich nutrients such as nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) (Rajan and Anandhan, 2015). Consequently, manure application can stimulate plant growth and increase crop yields by improving soil fertility (Gai et al., 2018, Naeem et al., 2017, Omara et al., 2017) and enhancing soil microbial and enzymatic activities (Lupwayi et al., 2005, Chen et al., 2017, Kotroczó et al., 2014). In China, a large amount of livestock manure is produced every year; in 2019, the amount of organic N in livestock manure was 16.77 million tonnes, whereas the amount of inorganic N in agricultural fertiliser was 26.87 million tonnes (FAOSTAT, 2021). Currently, livestock manure is a misplaced resource that is not fully utilised.
Excessive inputs of inorganic N fertiliser cause problems such as high cost, nitrate pollution and loss of soil carbon (C) (Lassaletta et al., 2014, Schoebitz and Vidal, 2016). Reasonable application of organic and chemical fertilisers can reduce the singular dependence of crops on chemical fertiliser, minimise nutrient loss and improve nutrient use efficiency (Zhao et al., 2009, Wang et al., 2018). Evidence suggests that a combination of manure and chemical fertiliser is an efficient approach to ensure soil productivity and environmental quality (Nkoa, 2014). If livestock manure can be used judiciously in agriculture, it will reduce the amount of chemical N fertiliser applied and thereby prevent the problems associated with excessive chemical fertilisation.
The effects of different ratios of manure to chemical fertiliser on the soil–plant system have been widely investigated (Riley, 2015, Wang et al., 2017, Aula et al., 2019). For example, Guan et al. (2011) showed that the use of chicken manure to replace 50% inorganic N and reduce 20% inorganic N promoted 8.3% N nutrient absorption by rice and contributed to the maintenance of crop yield compared with 100% inorganic N. Another experimental study also indicated that cattle manure (267 kg N ha−1) could be applied once over a four-year period to maintain winter wheat yield while improving soil pH and organic C content compared with the control (Aula et al., 2019). In addition, indirect methods based on laboratory incubation have been used to roughly measure the contribution of manure N to the soil. For example, Calderón et al. (2005) enclosed manure in mesh bags and buried it in the soil; after incubation, the changes of manure N content in mesh bags were measured to calculate the contribution of manure-derived N to soil N. In addition, Mohanty et al. (2011) calculated the contribution of manure-derived N to soil N by subtracting the mineral N content of soil treated with inorganic N alone from that of soil treated with combined manure and inorganic N after incubation. However, the fate of manure N in the soil–plant system and its relative contribution to the soil and crop plants have not yet been accurately calculated.
When compared with indirect measurement methods, 15N tracer technology allows for accurate and direct measurement of nutrient flow in manure and enables the measurement of manure-derived N distribution in the soil (Powell and Wu, 1999). Powell et al. (2004) reported that high levels of manure 15N enrichment can be used for long-term manure N cycling studies. Furthermore, Munoz et al. (2003) showed that the use of 15N-labelled manure supports the accurate measurement of total soil N and estimation of soil N balance. Therefore, we applied 15N-labelled cattle manure in combination with different rates of N fertiliser in a winter wheat system over a 2-year period. We then determined the amounts of manure-derived N in crop plants and the soil to accurately calculate the distribution of N derived from livestock manure and its relative contribution to crop plants and the soil. The results of this study could provide support for appropriate manure utilisation with respect to crop yield and N use efficiency.
Section snippets
Experimental site
The experimental site is located at the First Farming Station of Northwest A&F University in Yangling, Shaanxi Province, China (34°18' N, 108°05' E). Yangling is a part of the central–southern Loess Plateau, with a mean elevation of 520 m. It has a temperate continental monsoon climate, with a mean annual precipitation and temperature of 550 mm and 12.9 °C, respectively. The monthly mean precipitation and temperature during the wheat growing and fallow seasons are shown in Fig. 1. This area is
Wheat yield after the fertilisation treatments
When compared with manure application alone, the combined application of manure and chemical N fertiliser significantly increased the yield and ear number of wheat in both 2019 and 2020 (Table 2). The yields after M+N75, M+N150, M+N225 and M+N300 treatments were significantly higher than that after M treatment (P < 0.05). The highest yield of wheat was obtained at 6530 kg ha–1 in 2019 and 7236 kg ha–1 in 2020 after M+N225treatment. The highest ear number of wheat reached 470 × 104 ha–1 in 2019
Grain yield of wheat in response to different fertilisation treatments
Manure application can stimulate crop production, improve soil quality, and reduce fertiliser input cost (Obour et al., 2016). Here, we found that the use of cattle manure in combination with N fertiliser did increase the crop yield; however, the wheat yield first increased and then decreased as the N application increased, indicating there is a reasonable ratio of cattle manure to N fertiliser for increasing the crop yield (Table 2). M+N225 was the optimal treatment for winter wheat yield in
Conclusion
We used 15N-labelled cattle manure in combination with different rates of N fertiliser to treat the soil in a winter wheat field. All treatments with manure and N fertiliser improved wheat yield when compared with manure application alone. However, the contribution of manure-derived N to the soil and plant N pools changed with different N application rates. The use of manure with a low to intermediate rate of N fertiliser increased plant absorption of manure-derived N and reduced the
Funding
The work reported in this manuscript was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31772389), the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2018YFD0200403), the National Science and Technology Support Program (2015BAD23B04) and the Special Fund for Agricultural Research in Public Welfare Industry (201503124). This study was also supported by the College of Natural Resources and Environment, Northwest A&F University.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
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