Impact of Using Compost Bokashi Resulting from Recycling Kitchen Waste on Head Lettuce (Lactuca sativa var. capitata L.)Grown Organically at Home

Abstract

A pot experiment was conducted at the Experimental Farm of Environment& Bio-Agriculture Dept., Fac. Agric., Al-AzharUniv., NasrCity, Cairo, Egypt, during the winter season of 2015 to study the impact of using compost bokashi resulting from recycling kitchen waste on head lettuce(Lactuca sativa L. var. Capitata L.)grown organically at home. After 30 days from add compost bokashi to pots filled with soil. Pots were cultivated with head lettuce plant. The experiment consisted of 4 treatments the full dose of fertilizer mineral T1 and three other treatments for compost bokashi : ( 1volume of compost bokashi : 4 volumes of soil T2) , ( 1volume of compost bokashi : 6 volumes of soil T3) , and ( 1volume of compost bokashi : 8 volumes of soil T4) . The use of these treatments once without spraying bokashi juice (liquid produced during the fermentation processand again with bokashi juice at a rate of 1 bokashi juice to 300 cm from water free of chlorine. Spraying was twice, the first after three weeks from transplanting, the second after seven weeks from transplanting.Results could be summarized as follows: The Treatment T2 led to increase the nitrogen, phosphorus, iron, copper, zinc and manganese soil content, while the Treatment T3 led to increase the potassium soil content which it was estimated after the addition of compost for 30 days and before planting directly.For the total number of aerobic bacteria outperformed all treatments on control, it was recorded 29.86, 30.66and 29.70X 10 5C.F.U /g-1 of soil for each of the T1, T2 and T3, respectively.While the control treatment T1 recorded 16.93 X 105 C.F.U/ g-1 of soil.As for the total number of fungi T4 recorded the highest value 170 x 10 4 C.F.U/g-1 of soil. For the number of actinomycets. T2 recorded the highest value 166.3 X 10 4 C.F.U/g-1 of soil. The treatment T2 ( 1 bokashi : 4 compost soil )without bokashi juice gave the highest value for each of the(plant fresh weight (g), head fresh weight (g), number of leaves / head-1, head diameter (cm), and head dry weight (g/100g head fresh weight) over the control (full dose of mineral fertilizer). The foliar spray with bokashi juice decreased all vegetative growth, except number of leaves there was no significant difference between sprayed and non-sprayed plants. The treatment T2 without and with foliar application gave the highest value nitrate and chlorophyll content of head lettuce. The T1 Full dose of mineral fertilizer (control) was higher than all treatments for the head and the outer leaves of total count of aerobic bacteria without, with foliar application. With regard to the fungi counts of head lettuce plants results showed that there no significant differences as a result of spray or not to spray, as well as the interaction effect between them. The T1 full dose of mineral fertilizer (control) was higher than all treatments for the head and the outer leaves of total count coliform bacteria without, with foliar application. The results indicated that the absence both of salmonella and shigella bacteria on head and out leaves lettuce plants.