The effect of diet manipulation on nitrous oxide and methane emissions from manure application to incubated grassland soils

• Published in: Atmospheric environment (1994) 2007-10, Vol.41 (33), p.7096-7107
• Main Authors: Cardenas, L.M., Chadwick, D., Scholefield, D., Fychan, R., Marley, C.L., Jones, R., Bol, R., Well, R., Vallejo, A.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Applied sciences; Atmospheric pollution; Brassica; Brassica oleracea; Denitrification; Diet; Dispersed sources and other; Exact sciences and technology; Lolium; Medicago sativa; Methane; Nitrogen; Nitrous oxide; Pollution; Pollution sources. Measurement results; Sheep slurry
• ISSN: 1352-2310; 1873-2844
• DOI: 10.1016/j.atmosenv.2007.04.055

Changes to agricultural management, particularly of the nitrogen (N) input to farms, have great potential for mitigating emissions of N containing gases, especially the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide (N 2O). Manipulating diets fed to livestock is a potential method for controlling N excretion and emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG's) to the atmosphere. We selected three slurries derived from sheep that had been fed, either ensiled ryegrass ( Lolium hybridicum), lucerne ( Medicago sativa) or kale ( Brassica oleracea) and applied them to a grassland soil from the UK in a laboratory experiment using a special He/O 2 atmosphere incubation facility. The resulting fluxes of N 2O, CH 4 and N 2 were measured, with the largest total N fluxes generated by the ryegrass slurry treatment (14.23 ryegrass, 10.84 lucerne, 13.88 kale and 4.40 kg N ha −1 from the control). Methane was emitted only from the ryegrass slurry treatment. The isotopomer signatures for N 2O in the control and lucerne slurry treatments indicated that denitrification was the main process responsible for N 2O emissions.