EC Nebraska | ollie1983 - 2/19/2015 19:47
Ammonia is poisonous to a lot of organisms- this is why so many of them use the urea cycle to deal with nitrogen metabolism.
Urea is by far the most soil friendly source of nitrogen, firstly it breaks down slowly so you don't get highly elevated nitrate levels in localised spots, secondly it contains carbon.
That's an interesting statement. I would never have considered urea to "break down" slowly. Do you mean the conversion to nitrate? That does take some time, depending on the level of bacterial activity in the soil, but urea converts to ammonia first before it can be converted into nitrate. That reaction can take place fairly rapidly on warm soils. It can take place within hours in a high residue, high pH, warm temperature situation.
I find your statement to be rather puzzling, considering that Urea converts to ammonia in the soil fairly rapidly. Perhaps you're comparing broadcast urea to the banded anhydrous ammonia.
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