Pollution of drainage water with nitrogen when slurry is applied in crop rotation fields

Abstract

The studies on nitrogen leaching due to slurry applied in different seasons os the year were carried out in Juodkiskis study object of Water Management Institute of Lithuanian University of Agriculture within the study period of 1999-2003. From the point of view of the environment protection, it is not dangerous to apply slurry on red clover fields, because then N concentrations contained in drainage water do not exceed the maximum allowable concentration (the average N-total concentration was 3.7 mg/l). When applying slurry on annual crops, N concentrations contained in soil are to be taken into consideration. The study has also proved that slurry applied in spring determined 11.5% less intensive N leaching than in the variants where slurry was applied in autumn. Keywords