Comparison of Nitrate Contents for Reed Canarygrass and Orchardgrass in Large Amounts of Compound Fertilization

Comparison of Nitrate Contents for Reed Canarygrass and Orchardgrass in Large Amounts of Compound Fertilization

Reed canarygrass (Phalaris arundinacea L.) could be an ideal candidate for manure application. We compared its growth, crude protein (CP) and nitrate N (NO³-N) content to that of orchardgrass (Dactylis glomerata L.) on different levels of nitrogen fertilization (3,10,15 and 20g N m^-2, applied from May 15 to September 15 after each monthly cutting. The dry weight (DW) of reed canarygrass increased significantly with increasing amounts of N nitrogen on July, August and September. However, orchardgrass only showed a significant increase in yield on September. The concentration of CP of reed canarygrass was significantly lower than that of orchardgrass with 3 g N m^-2 on June, July, August and 10 g N m^-2 on August. In contrast to this, CP of reed canarygrass was significantly higher than that of orchardgrass with 15 g N m^-2 on July and 20 g N m^-2 on July and August. NO³-N content of reed canarygrass was significantly lower than that of orchardgrass with 3 g N m^-2 and 10 g N m^-2 on June, July and August. We had high NO³-N (> 0.15% N as NO³-N was considered unsafe) with 15 g N m^-2 and 20 g N m^-2 in both forage species and with 10 g N m^-2 in orchardgrass. Our results indicate that reed canarygrass accumulates less NO³-N than orchardgrass with applications of 3 g N m^-2 and 10 g N m^-2 per cutting.