Effects of organic manure on nitrification in arable soils

Abstract

The production of nitrate by the process of nitrification is highly dependent on other N-transforming processes in the soil. Hence, changes in the type of N compound applied to enrich agricultural soils may affect the production of nitrate. The size and activity of the chemolithotrophic bacterial community were studied in an integrated farming system, with increased inputs of organic manure and reduced inputs of mineral nitrogenous fertilizer, versus conventional farming. The integrated farming had a positive effect on potential nitrifying activity, but not on the numbers of chemolithotrophic nitrifying bacteria as determined by a most probable number technique or by fluorescence antibody microscopy. Cells of the recently described nitrite-oxidizing species Nitrobacter hamburgensis and Nitrobacter vulgaris were just as common as the cells of the well known species Nitrobacter winogradskyi. It was concluded that nitrification is stimulated by integrated farming, presumably by an increased mineralization of ammonium which is not immediately consumed by the crop or immobilized in the heterotrophic microflora of the soil. Since nitrifying bacteria are involved in the production of NO and N2O, integrated farming with the application of manure may favour the production of noxious N-oxides.