Effects of yard waste compost and maize (Zea mays) cultivar on population densities of plant-parasitic nematodes were examined in four experiments in north Florida. In one experiment, eight maize cultivars were evaluated; the other three experiments involved split-plot designs with compost treatments as main plots and maize cultivars as subplots. The three compost treatments used in these exper...

ABSTRACT Compost tea is being used increasingly in agricultural production to control plant diseases. However, there has been limited investigation relating disease control efficacy to various compost tea production methods, particularly compost tea produced with active aeration and additives to increase microbial population densities in compost tea. Aerated compost tea (ACT) and nonaerated com...

Municipal compost sample was pyrolyzed to produce compost char as a sorbent for removing the herbicide atrazine from solution. The compost-based char was compared with an activated carbon derived from corn stillage. When compost was pyrolyzed, the char yield was greater than 45% when heated under air, and 52% when heated under N2. In contrast, when the corn stillage was pyrolyzed under N2, the ...

This study examined macro-nutrient content of solid waste compost to determine the potential of the compost for soil fertility amelioration in Ghana. Heavy metal concentrations in the compost were also examined to assess the potential health implication of compost application in urban and peri-urban agriculture. It was observed that the overall NPK concentration was low in the different compost...

Extracts from compost infested with Caenorhabditis elegans suppressed mycelial growth of Agaricus brunnescens. An extract from uninfested compost also inhibited mycelial growth but to a lesser degree. The critical role of compost bacteria and/or other compost micro-organisms is implicated by these results.

Biodynamic (BD) agriculture, a form of organic agriculture, includes the use of specially fermented preparations, but peer-reviewed studies on their efficacy are rare. Composting of a grape pomace and manure mixture was studied in two years (2002 and 2005) with and without the BD compost preparations. Water extracts of finished composts were then used to fertigate wheat seedlings, with and with...

Arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi form symbiotic associations with most crop plant species in agricultural ecosystems, and are conspicuously influenced by various agricultural practices. To understand the impact of compost addition on AM fungi, we examined effect of four compost rates (0, 11.25, 22.5, and 45 Mg/ha) on the abundance and community composition of AM fungi in seedling, flowering, a...

Among the aquatic weeds, water hyacinth is considered to be the most obnoxious of all aquatic weeds and occupies eighth rank in the world. Water hyacinth caused lot of problems to human beings and animals in many ways. The present study is therefore aimed to develop an appropriate technology for recovery of resources from aquatic weeds by pit methods of composting. Compost was prepared from aqu...

This study aims to assess the effect of EM application on the composting process of rice straw with goat manure and green waste and to evaluate the quality of both compost treatments. There are two treatment piles in this study, in which one pile was applied with EM and another pile without EM. Each treatment was replicated three times with 90 days of composting duration. The parameters for the...