Shaun Casteel, Soil Science, North Carolina State University, Box 7619, NCSU - Williams Hall, 100 Derieux Street, Raleigh, NC 27695, Brenda Cleveland, N. Carolina Dept. of Agriculture & Consumer Serv., 1040 Mail Service Ctr, Raleigh, NC 27699-1040, Deanna Osmond, PO Box 7619, North Carolina State University, North Carolina State University, Soil Science Dept., Raleigh, NC 27695, and Colleen Hudak-Wise, North Carolina, Dept. of Agric., NCDA & CS, 1040 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 27699.
The goal of nutrient management is to manage the amount, source, placement, form and timing nutrient(s) and soil amendment(s) applications. Nutrient management plans budget nutrients for plant production, manage manure applications while minimizing environmental concerns (point and non-point pollution) to the air and water, and maintain the sustainability of soil systems (physical, chemical and biological). National Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) in North Carolina provides guidelines for nutrient management planning where one must comply with federal, state, and local laws and regulations. According to the NRCS Standard 590, nutrient values of the animal waste can be established based on laboratory analysis, default values, or historical records. When an operation’s historic waste analyses is not available, nutrient management planners use NRCS Waste Utilization Standard 633 to estimate animal waste nutrient values. This standard was developed by NC State University in the 1990s and is in need of revision. The Plant/Waste/Solution (PWS) section of the NC Department of Agriculture–Agronomic Division annually analyzes approximately 15,000 waste samples where the majority is swine and poultry wastes with some dairy analyses. NCDA-PWS and NC State University collaborated to review the animal waste nutrient concentrations analyzed over the past decade in an effort to update the default values and, thus, create a more useful dataset for nutrient planning and recommendations. Animal waste nutrient values are summarized by year, animal, waste type, and application method.
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