Article ID Journal Published Year Pages File Type
8879273 Field Crops Research 2018 11 Pages PDF
Abstract
Sulfur deficiency has become more common in the last decades and the demand for S fertilizers has increased. Commercial fertilizers containing elemental S (S0 or ES) are usually in granular form, but their efficiency under field conditions has rarely been studied. A field trial with stable isotope (34S) as tracer was carried out to assess the uptake of ES and SO4-S applied as S-fortified ammonium phosphate fertilizer. The fertilizer, which contained 5% ES and 5% SO4-S, was broadcast applied in spring or in fall and the contribution of fertilizer S was assessed over two years, by analyzing the corn plants at early stage and at maturity. In the first year, near equal amounts (12-14%) of S in the plant were derived from fertilizer ES and SO4-S for the spring applied fertilizer, while more S was derived from fertilizer ES (12%) than from fertilizer SO4-S (5%) with fall-applied fertilizer. In the second year, the contribution of fertilizer S decreased and was greater for ES than for SO4-S in all cases. As demonstrated through modeling, the results could be explained based on leaching of applied SO4-S, particularly when fall-applied, cycling in organic matter, and oxidation of ES with an estimated rate of 0.005 d−1 at 20 °C. This study demonstrates the benefit of ES as a slow release S fertilizer in high-rainfall environments.
Related Topics
Life Sciences Agricultural and Biological Sciences Agronomy and Crop Science
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