Pile mixing increases greenhouse gas emissions during composting of dairy manure.

The effect of pile mixing on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions during dairy manure composting was determined using large flux chambers designed to completely cover replicate pilot-scale compost piles. GHG emissions from compost piles that were mixed four times during the 80 day trial were approximately 20% higher than emissions from unmixed (static) piles. For both treatments, carbon dioxide (CO(2)), methane (CH(4)), and nitrous oxide (N(2)O) accounted for 75-80%, 18-21%, and 2-4% of GHG emissions, respectively. Seventy percent of CO(2) emissions and 95% of CH(4) emissions from all piles occurred within first 23 days. By contrast, 80-95% of N(2)O emissions occurred after this period. Mixed and static piles released 2 and 1.6 kg GHG (CO(2)-Eq.) for each kg of degraded volatile solids (VS), respectively. Our results suggest that to minimize GHG emissions, farmers should store manure in undisturbed piles or delay the first mixing of compost piles for approximately 4 weeks.

Evaluation of biogas production potential by dry anaerobic digestion of switchgrass--animal manure mixtures.

Anaerobic digestion is a biological method used to convert organic wastes into a stable product for land application with reduced environmental impacts. The biogas produced can be used as an alternative renewable energy source. Dry anaerobic digestion [>15% total solid (TS)] has an advantage over wet digestion (<10% TS) because it allows for the use of a smaller volume of reactor and because it reduces wastewater production. In addition, it produces a fertilizer that is easier to transport. Performance of anaerobic digestion of animal manure-switchgrass mixture was evaluated under dry (15% TS) and thermophilic conditions (55 degrees C). Three different mixtures of animal manure (swine, poultry, and dairy) and switchgrass were digested using batch-operated 1-L reactors. The swine manure test units showed 52.9% volatile solids (VS) removal during the 62-day trial, while dairy and poultry manure test units showed 9.3% and 20.2%, respectively. Over the 62 day digestion, the swine manure test units yielded the highest amount of methane 0.337 L CH4/g VS, while the dairy and poultry manure test units showed very poor methane yield 0.028 L CH4/g VS and 0.002 L CH4/g VS, respectively. Although dairy and poultry manure performed poorly, they may still have high potential as biomass for dry anaerobic digestion if appropriate designs are developed to prevent significant volatile fatty acid (VFA) accumulation and pH drop.

Factors affecting the toxicity of methylmercury injected into eggs.

We developed a standardized protocol for comparing the sensitivities of the embryos of different bird species to methylmercury when methylmercury was injected into their eggs. During the course of developing this protocol, we investigated the effects of various factors on the toxicity of the injected methylmercury. Most of our experiments were done with chicken (Gallus domesticus), mallard (Anas platyrhynchos), and ring-necked pheasant (Phasianus colchicus) eggs, all of which were purchased in large numbers from game farms. A smaller amount of work was done with double-crested cormorant (Phalacrocorax auritus) eggs collected from the wild. Several solvents were tested, and corn oil at a rate of 1 microl/g egg contents was selected for the final standardized protocol because it had minimal toxicity to embryos and because methylmercury dissolved in corn oil yielded a dose-response curve in a range of egg concentrations that was similar to the range that causes reproductive impairment when the mother deposits methylmercury into her own eggs. The embryonic stage at which eggs were injected with corn oil altered mercury toxicity; at early stages, the corn oil itself was toxic. Therefore, in the final protocol we standardized the time of injection to occur when each species reached the morphologic equivalent of a 3-day-old chicken embryo. Although solvents can be injected directly into the albumen of an egg, high embryo mortality can occur in the solvent controls because of the formation of air bubbles in the albumen. Our final protocol used corn oil injections into the air cell, which are easier and safer than albumen injections. Most of the methylmercury, when dissolved in corn oil, injected into the air cell passes through the inner shell membrane and into the egg albumen. Most commercial incubators incubate eggs in trays with the air cell end of the egg pointing upward, but we discovered that mercury-induced mortality was too great when eggs were held in this orientation. In addition, some species of bird eggs require incubation on their sides with the eggs being rolled 180 degrees for them to develop normally. Therefore, we adopted a procedure of incubating the eggs of all species on their sides and rolling them 180 degrees every hour. Little has been published about the conditions of temperature, humidity, and the movements to which eggs of wild birds need to be subjected for them to hatch optimally under artificial incubation. Not unexpectedly, hatching success in an artificial incubator is generally less than what natural incubation by the parents can achieve. However, the survival of control embryos of most wild bird species was good (generally > or = 80%) up to within 1 or 2 days of hatching when we incubated the eggs at 37.5 degrees C (or 37.6 degrees C for gallinaceous species) at a relative humidity that resulted in an approximate 15% to 16% loss in egg weight by the end of incubation and by incubating the eggs on their sides and rolling them 180 degrees /h. To improve statistical comparisons, we used survival through 90% of incubation as our measurement to compare survival of controls with survival of eggs injected with graded concentrations of mercury.