Abstract

Poultry manure (PM) is a great nutrient source for plant growth. PM enhances soil properties and increases the crop yield. As an important strategy to decrease the amount of inorganic phosphorus (P) fertilizers, the combined use of rock phosphate (RP) with PM has been found to be more advantageous for sustainable agriculture than their single use. The objective was to assess the effect of PM on P availability in Andisols and RP dissolution. In the first incubation, an Andisol was mixed with 100, 200, and 300 mg P kg−1 rate using PM, and Olsen P was determined at 1, 3, 5, 7, and 10 days. In the second experiment, four Andisols were incubated with 200 and 300 mg P kg−1 soil for 20 days and acid phosphatase activity (APase) was measured. In the last experiment, PM and rock phosphate (RP) were mixed at two different rates: 50:50 and 70:30 for 30 days and total inorganic P was determined. We found that Andisols amended with PM increased P availability and APase, and the mixture of PM:RP at 70:30 showed the highest inorganic P. We therefore conclude that PM addition may improve P availability in soil as well as in combination with RP.