Occurrence of trace elements and antibiotics in manure-based fertilizers from the Zhejiang Province of China

Occurrence of seven trace elements and forty three antibiotics was investigated in manure-based fertilizers in Zhejiang province of China. The trace elements included copper, zinc, arsenic, chromium, mercury, lead and cadmium; the targeted antibiotics included four groups: sulfonamides, tetracyclines, fluoroquinolones and chloramphenicols. The medium values of copper, zinc, arsenic, chromium, mercury, lead and cadmium in the analyzed samples were 160, 465, 7.9, 21.2, 0.3, 8.1 and 0.6 mg·kg− 1, respectively. Seventeen antibiotics were detected. Enrofloxacin was the most frequently detected compound with the detection rate of 39.3% and the concentrations ranged from 6.7 μg·kg− 1 to 4091 μg·kg− 1. Based on the referred loading rates, 10% of the collected manure-based fertilizers might pose a high potential ecological risk after their application onto agriculture soil due to the presence of antibiotics.88