Influence of Chicken Manure on Growth and Yield of Forage Sorghum (Sorghum Bicolor L.Moench )

Abstract

The increasingly demand of chicken meat in Sudan has prompted more poultry farming with consequent ef- fects on increased utilization of organic wastes (e.g. chicken manure) as fertilizers. Organic wastes contain varying amounts of water, mineral nutrients and organic matter. While the use of organic wastes as manure has been in practice for centuries world-wide. A field experiment was conducted at the Experimental Farm of the Faculty of Agriculture, University of Khartoum, Shambat during the period (February - May 2007) to study the effect of different rates of chicken manure on growth and forage yield of sorghum (Sorghum bicolor (L.), Moench). The treatments consisted of four levels of chicken manure; 0, 1.2, 2.5 and 5.0 tons/ha. The treatments were arranged in a Randomized Complete Block Design in four repli- cates. The character studies were plant population, plant height, number of leaves per plant, stem diameter, leaf area index, and fresh and dry forage yield. The results showed that there were significant differences among treatments in most pa- rameters during the growing period for growth attributes under study. Chicken manure resulted in an increase in growth attributes as well as forage yield. Chicken manure (5 tons/ha) produced higher fresh and dry forage at harvest than the other treatments.