Nitrogen in Agricultural Landscape

Lech Wojciech Szajdak, Lech Wojciech Szajdak

• Publisher: CRC Press
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000350876
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Technology & Engineering
• Subtopic: Forestry
• Index: Technology & Engineering

Agriculture transforms the environment. The simplification of agroecosystems structure increases the hazards of leaching, wind and water erosion, and volatilization of chemicals from soil. Soil nitrogen is of interest as a major crop nutrient, but also as a potential environmental pollutant. Knowledge about the behavior of soil nitrogen is desirable in order to optimize plant growth and crop yield and to minimize environmental side effects. This book also gives information about the function of biogeochemical barriers in the form of shelterbelts, which efficiently decrease the concentrations of various forms of nitrogen in ground water.

Chapter 1

Nitrogen Content Under Blueberry Cultivation

Amalia Ioana Boţ¹*, Ioan Făcurarl¹ and Lech Wojciech Szajdak²

¹‘University of Agricultural Sciences and Veterinary Medicine, Cluj-Napoca, Romania

²Institute for Agricultural and Forest Environment, Polish Academy of Sciences, Poznań, Poland.

Among the mineral substances that play a major role in plant nutrition, the most important substance is nitrogen, which is available to plants in the mineral forms (ammonium and nitrates) and organic (amino acids, amines, amides, alkaloids, etc.). Nitrogen is also important for the ‘synthesis of enzymes’, as it is a component of enzymes that catalyze biochemical reactions in plants and has an indirect role in all enzymatic reactions of biosynthesis or decomposition of organic matter. Due to this significance, many authors study the content of nitrogen under his various forms in order to determine the most suitable content for a sustainable crop regarding the species.

This chapter discusses research conducted in Romania, in eight blueberry plantations from the north-west region of the country. The purpose of the study was to determine the content of nitrogen, ammonium and nitrates under blueberry cultivation. The results were conducted in 2016–2017 and have a significant value for future studies and for future farmers as well because it answers many questions regarding the best way to cultivate this species, which is more and more harvested in Romania and also emphasises the importance of nitrogen for all agricultural landscape.

INTRODUCTION

Nowadays there is a trend among the human population to consume food produced in ecological conditions that have a high nutrient content and supplies vitamins and minerals that are necessary for the good and healthy functioning of the human body. For this reason, an emphasis is placed on growing fruit and vegetables under environmentally friendly conditions with no chemical fertilizers; the crops grown on natural organic fertilizers are being increasingly appreciated.

Taking this into account, the question arises as to which crop culture can be set up under natural soil and climate conditions so that it can satisfy the current needs and requirements of the population at the same time. Therefore, in the light of the above, a study was carried out which aimed to both analyze the content of bio-chemical elements in the soil as well as the content of substances that have different benefits on the human body.

The target species for the research was highbush blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum L.), which was chosen for several reasons. First of all, the growing cultivation trend of this species during recent years in Romania, which is why we have studied eight blueberry plantations located in the North-West Development Region of Romania Second, the research done mainly in the medical field regarding the benefits of consuming blueberry fruits by the human body and the benefits arising from the antioxidant compounds found in the fruits was a major factor in deciding on the choice of this species for research.

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*For Correspondence: [email protected].

The main objective of the study—which was discovered in the Ph.D. thesis titled “Assessment of Land Favorability from Northwest Region of Development for Blueberry Crop (Vaccinium corymbosum) in the Context of Sustainable Development of the Territory”—refers to the assessment of the pedological potential of certain soil types in the studied region for blueberry cultivation as well as the influence of certain soil compounds on the antioxidant capacity of blueberry fruits.

Listed above are a few of the reasons why this species stirs up an increasing interest among researchers in the agricultural and medical field. Moreover, another equally important aspect that has to be taken into consideration is the cultivation method of this species.

Organic or ecological farming has not only grown to meet people’s needs for consuming organic products but also the conventional agriculture and industry is responsible for the climate change that we are currently facing. The gravity of the climate change situation in recent years has been noted at the UN Conference on Climate Change in Paris in 2015, reaching a unanimous agreement to “keep the average global temperature rise below 2°C, above pre-industrial levels and continue efforts to limit temperature rise to 1.5°C” as a long-term goal (unfccc.int/resource/docs/2015/cop21/eng/10a01.pdf).

On the basis of this agreement and the reports that have been drawn up over time by the institutions around the world, it was unanimously agreed that in order to avoid endangering long-term sustainable development of future generations, changes that take into account the present realities in industrial, technological and agricultural management are necessary (Boţ 2017).

Blueberries are among the species that can be cultivated in an organic system, but above all, it can bring significant profit to farmers, which is why, besides its benefits to human health, this species is also a desirable way of farming nowadays.

Highbush blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum L.) is a native species of North America and is also found in spontaneous flora of Romania. It prefers mountain areas, coniferous forests, soils with acidic pH and sunny exposure (Clapa 2006) but is increasingly gaining ground in cultivation for human consumption, which demonstrates awareness of the high economic potential and its antioxidant properties, as well as the beneficial effects of the human body, reinforced by the medical studies (Bunea et al. 2011, Forney et al. 2012, Gibson et al. 2013, Mehvesh et al. 2013, Kazim et al. 2015, Skrovankova et al. 2015, Cardetiosa et al. 2016).

Increased use of food rich in bioactive substances, vitamins and minerals, necessary for the optimal development of the body, awareness of the dangers that may arise from the effects of global climate change along with recent medical and agricultural research propels this shrub in the top of the varieties that simultaneously meet all the conditions listed (Boţ 2017).

Another important aspect that needs to be taken into account when we want to motivate research on this shrub is also the increase in the number of blueberries cultivation and its world production. A study by Michalska and Lysiak in 2015 shows that the global production of ...