RESPONSE OF WHEAT-MAIZE YIELDS AND THEIR NUTRIENTS STATUS TO THE APPLICATION OF NATURAL MINERALS UNDER CONDITIONS OF BOTH ORGANIC MANURING AND BIOFERTILIZATION

Calcareous soil is relatively poor in plant nutrients and organic contents. Such great problem may be solved by applying organic manure and natural minerals. Therefore, using natural sources (NS), either mineral or rock (feldspar, magnetite ore including certain micronutrients (MO) and rock phosphate), may be considered a specific management program for reducing the needs for imported chemical fertilizers which are expensive than those natural ones. Four treatments which were:- 1- Either rice straw compost (RSC) or farmyard manure (FYM) alone, 2- RSC enriched with macronutrients or FYM enriched with macronutrients (RSC+Ma or FYM+Ma), 3- RSC enriched with Micronutrients or FYM enriched with Micronutrients (RSC+Mi or FYM+Mi) and 4- Organic sources (RSC or FYM) enriched with macronutrients and micronutrients supply (ERSC and EFYM). These treatments were either un-inoculated or inoculated with a mixture of phosphorus, potassium and calcium dissolving bacteria to study the effects of these treatments on macronutrients availability in soil, nutritional status and yield components of both wheat and maize crops.
Results showed general high significant increases for available N, P and K, yields (straw and grains) of both wheat and maize along with their total content of the indicated macronutrients due to the application of ERSC in presence of inoculation as compared to RSC alone (without application of  macro or micro elements). With regard to effect of inoculation with dissolving nutrients bacteria, there was insignificant effect on the studied parameters through the two studied seasons. In spite of that, the inoculation was superior more than non-inoculation. As far as applied organic sources, results indicated that values representing parameters studied for both crops more increased due to adding the RSC as compared to FYM. Moreover, positive effect of EOM treatment (average of ERSC and EFYM) on macronutrients availability in soil, their total content in plant and yield components for the two studied seasons was more positively affected significantly as compared to other treatments. Finally, data indicated that the ERSC can be used as a source of fertilization in presence of the nutrients dissolving bacteria in calcareous soils and expected to be economic as well as environmentally safe.