Marcus Alley, Crop & Soil Env Sci Dept, Blacksburg, VA 24061-0403, Gregory Binford, Univ of Delaware, 152 Townsend Hall, Newark, DE 19716, Steven Phillips, Eastern Shore AREC, 33446 Research Dr., Painter, VA 23420, and Deanna Osmond, North Carolina State Univ, Dept of Soil Science, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Campus Box 7619, 100 Derieux St, Williams Hall, Raleigh, NC 27695.
Increasing fertilizer nutrient use efficiency is an economic
and environmental need. This report
summarizes data on crop response in the mid-Atlantic Coastal Plain to new
fertilizer materials that may enhance nutrient use efficiency. Fertilizer materials that have been recently
evaluated include Environmentally Smart Nitrogen (ESN), a polymer coated
granular urea fertilizer; Nitamin, a new urea formaldehyde polymer, formulated
as a 30% N liquid and in dry granular materials with urea; and a polymer coated
NPK fertilizer, Haifa Multigro. Studies
with winter wheat in Delaware
indicate that ESN mixed with a soluble N source could provide value as a
late-winter early spring topdressing material.
A granular formulation of urea with 10% Nitamin N did not provide
sufficient slow release N to be superior to split spring N applications of
urea-ammonium nitrate solution (UAN).
Similarly, both ESN and Nitamin 30L applied preplant to corn did not provide
superior performance to split application of UAN solution. North Carolina studies also found no
differences in maize grain yield, stover yield, NUE and soil N contents between
UAN solution and Nitamin 30 L applications. A single application of Nitamin 30L
in Virginia
produced equal cotton lint yield and higher quality with a preplant application
compared to the standard split application.
Nitamin 30L also increased early- to mid-growing season N uptake by
tomato compared to the standard 4-0-8 liquid fertilizer, resulting in
equivalent fruit yield and significantly lower soil water NO3-N at a
1-m depth. A single, pre-plant in-bed
application of Nitamin 30L did not result in the premium size tomato
distribution attained using the standard split fertigation strategy. The Haifa Multigro fertilizer was also
evaluated for staked tomato production.
The standard injected 4-0-8 treatment resulted in greater total fruit
yield compared to each of the Haifa Multigro treatments.