The Effect of Different Nutrient Sources On Biomass and Selected Nutritional Quality of Switchgrass for Animal Feed.

To make switchgrass (Panicum virgatum) production dual purpose, a field experiment was conducted in Oklahoma, Perkins Agronomy Research Station. In this dual purpose switchgrass production approach, it was proposed that the early harvest can be used as animal feed and the late harvest as raw material for bio-fuel. However, this could deplete the soil fertility due to huge biomass harvest that will remove soil nutrients as well. To make this double purpose production possible, we evaluate the effect of different nutrient sources on biomass production and selected quality of switchgrass for animal feed and raw material for bio-fuel. The different nutrient sources included were cattle manure, poultry litter, legume cover crop, urea, NPK fertilizer and a control in four replications. The organic and chemical fertilizers were applied to provide equivalent amount of major nutrients. Agronomic data were collected and samples were analyzed for different parameters in the SWAFL of Oklahoma State University. Data was analyzed using GLM of SAS computer software. This paper summarized findings in relation to switchgrass production for animal feed. Some selected quality indicators of swtichgrass such as crude protein, potassium, iron, magnesium and calcium content were found to be statistically significant for the different treatments. The organic sources of nutrients results in increased crude protein, potassium, iron, magnesium and calcium content than the chemical fertilizers. There was no much difference on the use of legume cover crop and chemical fertilizers for these parameters. Even if statistically not significant, the higher dry biomass yield was reordered when urea is used as nutrient sources than other treatments.