Effect of Organic Fertilizers on Bioavailability of Potassium in Corn (Zea Mays L.)

Abstract

Organic fertilization to soil has become imperative need in order to achieve sustainable agricultural productivity. Because addition of organic sources of fertilizers support the soil to improve soil physical, chemical and biological properties and subsequently increased availability of nutrient particularly phosphorus (P) and potassium (K).It also helps the soil in increasing water holding capacity due to increased soil porosity by soil aggregation. A pot experiment was performed to identify the “effect of organic fertilizers on bioavailability of potassium in corn” by applying three types of organic sources to maize plants as farm yard manure, poultry manure and filter cake press mud (FCP). Five treatments were applied with four replications including T1 as control potassium or untreated with potassium fertilization (CK), T2 as inorganic fertilizers in recommended dose N: P : K @ 150: 100: 110 kg ha^-1, T3 as Farm yard manure (FYM) @ 10 tha^-1 along chemical N:P:K application, T4 as poultry manure @ 10 t ha^-1 also named as (compost-I) along chemical N:P:K application and T5 as press mud @ 10 t ha^-1 along recommended chemical N:P:K application. The results had demonstrated that all the organic and inorganic fertilizers had increased plant growth and quality attributes (plant height, plant stem diameter, total leaf chlorophyll contents, leaf are index (LAI), shoot and root dry weight, seed germination %, leaf P %, leaf K %, crop growth rate CGR and relative growth rate RGR) significantly as compared to control. Similarly soil chemical properties including organic matter (O.M %) contents, available and extractable concentration of P (ppm) and K (ppm) in soil also increased. All the organic sources had shown significant results but press mud application showed more availability of potassium element while poultry manure had increased P values in soil as well as in plant parts.