Effect Of Biochar And Other Amendments On The Ph Of Soils Derived From Four Parent Materials In South East Nigeria

ABSTRACT

 An incubation experiment was conducted at the Soil Science and Meteorology laboratory, Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike, to determine the effects of amendments namely Biochar, Ash and lime applied singly, and in basal combination with poultry manure, on pH of soils derived from four parent materials. The parent materials from which the soils were derived are coastal plain sand, shale, sandstone, and Alluvium. The treatments consisted of Biochar (B), Hydrated lime (L), Ash (A), Biochar + poultry manure (B+P), Lime + poultry manure (L+P), and Ash + poultry manure (B+P) applied at 1.43 gkg' representing 2 tons per hectare equivalent. The treatments were assigned to lOOgram of soil weighed out for the incubation study and were replicated three times in a completely randomized design. During the 12 weeks of incubation, the effect of the treatments on soil pH was measured, and all data subjected to analysis of variance (ANOVA), while the differences between the treatments were tested using GENSTAT package. The effects of the treatments on soil pH were determined at 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 12 weeks using the standard laboratory procedures. The results obtained from the study showed that at 6 weeks of incubation, the application of lime and lime + poultry manure significantly (p