Meat bone meal as fertiliser for barley and oat

Abstract

The traditional production of mineral N and P fertilisers is unsustainable due its reliance on fossil fuels in the case of N, and on limited mineral resource stocks in the case of P. The use of alternative or complementary fertilisers that originate from organic waste materials is gaining interest. Organic farms, especially arable organic farms without livestock, need usable sources of plant nutrients. Meat bone meal (MBM), a potential organic fertiliser for agricultural crops, contains considerable amounts of nutrients (on average 8% N, 5% P, 1% K and 10% Ca). In EU countries, Commission regulation (EC) No 181/2006 authorised the use of MBM as an organic fertiliser. In this study, MBM was compared to conventional mineral NPK fertiliser. Two randomised complete block split-plot field experiments were conducted: one with spring barley (Hordeum vulgare) in two years; and another with oat (Avena sativa) for three years, including a fourth year of testing for residual effect. Compared to mineral fertiliser (20% N, 3% P and 9% K), MBM was applied at three N levels: 60, 90 and 120 kg N ha -1 . The grain yield of both cereal species supported by MBM, did not differ from the yield obtained with the mineral fertiliser at any N level. At 120 kg N ha -1 , the grain yield level with either type was ca. 4500 kg ha -1 of barley and 5000 kg ha -1 of oat, representing fair averages for Finnish conditions. Moreover, MBM and mineral fertilisation showed no differences in quality in terms of 1000-grain weight, test-weight, protein content and protein yield. Since MBM has a low N/P ratio, P was applied in surplus to attain comparable N levels. Therefore MBM fertilisation should be fitted for crop rotation and for meeting environmental requirements.

Meat and bone meal as nitrogen and phosphorus supplier to cereals and oilseed rape

“…Salomonsson et al (1994Salomonsson et al ( , 1995 found no significant differences in protein yield for winter and spring wheat at different rates of MBM. However, Chen et al (2011) found a significant increase in the protein yield of spring barley and oat when increasing N level of MBM from 60 to 120 kg ha -1 .…”

“…Chen et al (2011) found that increasing MBM N from 60 to 120 kg ha -1 significantly increased barley yield. However, in our experiment, increasing N from 118 to 197 kg ha -1 did not increase any of the four crops' grain yields.…”

“…Soil amendment with animal meals has proven to generate satisfactory yields of crops, especially cereals and grasses (Salomonsson et al 1994, 1995, Jeng et al 2004, 2006, Ylivainio et al 2008, Simoes et al 2012. Currently, studies are carried out to evaluate the quality of yields after application of meat and bone meals or fertilizer products made from animal by-products (Chen et al 2011.…”

Calcium orthophosphates (CaPO 4 ): Occurrence and properties

“…Nowadays, cut and polished bones from a variety of animals are sometimes used as a starting material for jewelry and other crafts. Ground cattle bones are used as a fertilizer (Chen et al 2011b). Furthermore, in medicine, bones are used for bone graft substitutes, such allografts from cadavers (Delloye et al 2007) and xenografts (Araújo et al 2009).…”

The effect of meat and bone meal on phosphorus concentrations in soil and crop plants

“…Apart from manure, slurry, sludge and other organic wastes (Hanč et al 2008, Kulhánek et al 2008, meat and bone meals (MBM) can be a viable alternative to phosphate fertilizers (Valenzuela et al 2001, Jeng et al 2006, Svoboda et al 2010, Chen et al 2011, Brod et al 2012, Nogalska et al 2012. Agricultural utilization of MBM has become an important consideration since a complete ban on the feeding of ruminant-derived protein to ruminants, which was introduced to control bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).…”