Dick - Gypsum as a Soil Amendment

OHIO AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT CENTER

Gypsum as a Soil Amendment and Potential for Water Quality Benefits: Ohio Case Stury

Warren A. DickThe Ohio State University

[email protected]

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What is Gypsum?Gypsum is a very soft mineral composed of calcium sulfate dihydrate, with the chemical formula CaSO4·2H2O. The word gypsum is derived from a Greek word meaning "chalk" or "plaster". Gypsum is moderately water-soluble. The source of gypsum is both mined and synthetic.

Gypsum from New South Wales, Australia

Gypsum Powder

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Early History

Benjamin Franklin

“This hill has been land plastered”

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Early History

Dr. William Crocker - History of the Use of Agricultural Gypsum. 1922. Gypsum Industries Association, Chicago, IL (p. 7-36)

I. The Early Use of Gypsum as a Fertilizer

II. Recent Studies on the Function and Quantity of Calcium and Sulphur in Crops and and the Supply of Sulphur in our Agricultural Soils.

III. Calcium in the Nutrition of Plants

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Early HistoryHistory of the Use of AgriculturalGypsum. 1922. Gypsum Industries Association, Chicago, IL (p. 7-36)

IV. Gypsum as a Stimulant

V. Gypsum as Specific for Black Alkali

VI. Gypsum as a Preserver of Manure

VII. Effect of Gypsum on the Nitrogen Available for Crops

VIII. Gypsum Not a Substitute for Agricultural Lime

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History of Gypsum in AgricultureGypsum as a Preserver of Nitrogen – In pioneering work by Heiden:

“Gypsum has great power in preserving the volatile nature of manure. It does this in large part by transforming the volatile ammonium carbonate into the non-volatile ammonium sulfate with the formation of calcium carbonate.”

Further work on this topic was done by Ames and Richmond at The Ohio State Agricultural Experiment Station (Soil Science, 4:78-89, 1917). Using gypsum to preserve nitrogen for a 20 cow herd could provide $152 benefit in one year.

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Relative Numbers of Atoms Required by Plants

Mo 1Cu 100Zn 300Mn 1,000B 2,000Fe 2,000Cl 3,000S 30,000

P 60,000Mg 80,000Ca 125,000K 250,000N 1,000,000O 30,000,000C 35,000,000H 60,000,000

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Causes of Sulfur Deficiencies in Crops

Shift from low-analysis to high-analysis fertilizers

High-yielding crop varieties remove more S from fields at harvest

Reduced atmospheric S deposition Declining S reserves in soil due to loss of

organic matter (erosion and tillage), leaching, and crop removal

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3 4 5 6 7

10

203040506070

Dep

th (

cm)

pH

pH

Al3+

Typical pH profile for a Blount soil

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limestone + gypsumlimestone

1 2 3Corn Root Density m/1000 cm3

Depth

(cm)

20

40

60

80 Modified from Farina & Channon, SSSAJ (1988)

CaSO4 + Al3+ Al(SO4)+ + Ca2+

(toxic) (non-toxic)

Gypsum can ameliorate aluminum toxicity, especially in the subsoil, by forming soluble complexes with Al3+.

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Early History

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Two specific objectives:(1) Demonstrate at a field-scale the practical application of gypsum agricultural fields to reduce phosphorus loading to surface waters in the Maumee River and Grand Lake St. Mary’s watersheds in Ohio.

(2) Assess typical on-farm management practices to document/demonstrate agricultural practices that can best take advantage of FGD gypsum to enhance crop yields.

Ohio Department of Development Project

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Soil Test Values - Sulfur

Year (20yy)

Soil

Sulfu

r Con

tent

(ppm

)

Y = 28.6** - 1.74**R2 = 0.86

02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14

40

30

20

10

0

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Average Corn Yields from 2002 to 2005 (Ohio)

N Rate (kg ha-1)

0 50 100 150 200 2505.0

5.5

6.0

6.5

7.0

7.5

8.0

8.5

9.0

Y=5.80+0.029x-0.00009x2 (R2=0.85)Y=5.19+0.021x-0.00003x2 (R2=0.96)

SNo S

Cor

n G

rain

Yie

ld (B

u/A

)

170

150

130

110

90

0 45 90 135 180 225

N Rate (lbs/A)

(R2 = 0.85)(R2 = 0.96)

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Water Quality - Agriculture

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Phosphorus and Soil Management

Site Total P(0 - 12 in)

Soluble P(0 – 0.5 in)

Wooster 580 (PT)609 (NT)

45 (PT)160 (NT)

Hoytville 867 (PT)868 (NT)

38 (PT)282 (PT)

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Water soluble P in 0.5 in soil layer (4 T/A gypsum, 1:3 w/v soil:water)

0.000

1.000

2.000

3.000

4.000

5.000

6.000

7.000

8.000

9.000

10.000

CS - C CC CS – S

Hoytville Samples

+ Gypsum- Gypsum

Crop Rotation

10

8

6

4

2

0

Solu

ble

P (p

pm)

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Water Quality BenefitsEffect of Gypsum on Water Runoff, Soil Erosion and Soluble Reactive Phosphorus (SRP)

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Samples were collected from the Rolland WolfrumHale Farm (Hicksville, OH) on December 20, 2012.

Tile Drain

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Samples collected from the Ken Hahn Farm (Antwerp, OH) on January 6, 2013.

Tile Drainage Samples (1)

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Effect of Gypsum on P in Surface and Tile Waters

(Kevin King USDA-ARS)Mercer County very near to the Grand Lake St. Marys watershed

Overall Conclusion (to date)For water quality, the benefit of gypsum was to decrease soluble P concentrations and loading in surface water runoff and also concentrations of soluble and total P in tile discharge. When considering overall P loadings as well as concentrations, the water quality benefits after one year of gypsum were minimal. Testing into a second or third year will be extremely important to determine the longer-term benefits of gypsum to affect water quality.

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Summary of Gypsum Application Effects

The equation of the line that defines the points on the graph is y = 43.85 – 0.02063x where “y” is the percent reduction in phosphorus concentration and “x” is the number of days since gypsum application.

Tile Water Drainage Results – (through June 29, 2015)

(1) 89 Events Sampled(2) 9 Locations(3) P concentrations

Gyp(-) = 0.086 mg/LGyp(+) = 0.055 mg/L36% reduction

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Precipitation pH and PhosphorusNational Atmospheric Deposition Program (NRSP-3). 2007. NADP Program Office, Illinois

State Water Survey, 2204 Griffith Dr., Champaign, IL 61820

4.14.54.95.3 5.7

Lab pH

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Precipitation pH and PhosphorusPhosphorus is the nutrient most directly affected by soil pH

Soil pH

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National StandardNotice of Proposed Changes to the National Handbook of Conservation Practices for the Natural Resources Conservation Service

[Docket No. NRCS-2015-0003]

PROPOSED FULL TEXT FOR PRACTICE STANDARD CODE 333 (333-CPS-1)

Natural Resources Conservation ServiceCONSERVATION PRACTICE STANDARD

AMENDING SOIL PROPERTIES WITH GYPSUM PRODUCTSCode 333 (Ac.)

DEFINITIONUsing gypsum (calcium sulfate dihydrate) derived products to change the physical and/or

chemical properties of soil.

PURPOSE• Improve soil health by improving physical/chemical properties and increasing

infiltration of the soil.• Improve surface water quality by reducing dissolved phosphorus concentrations in surface

runoff and subsurface drainage.• Improve soil health by ameliorating subsoil aluminum toxicity.• Improve water quality by reducing the potential for pathogens and other contaminants

transport from areas of manure and biosolids application.

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http://ohioline.osu.edu/b945/index.html

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Increasing National Interest at the Scientific Level

https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/Gypsum/info

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The article (left) is a good overview of the problem and the current level of scientific understanding of its cause.

https://www.agronomy.org/publications/csa/pdfs/60/2/4

www.agronomy.org/files/publications/crops-and-soils/amending-soils-with-gypsum.pdf

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Conclusions

Gypsum, as an agricultural amendment, can provide multiple benefits including:

(1) improved crop production,(2) reduced soil erosion, and (3) reduced phosphorus movement off of agricultural

fields.

This leads to a win-win-win situation.

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Bioaccumulation Factors

Environment

Dick - Gypsum as a Soil Amendment