MICROBIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF POULTRY MANURE

ABSTRACT

Poultry manure as well called poultry litter is very rich in nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium thereby making it very important as a source of fertilizer to the soil and nutrient to the crops, its also an import source of energy and livestock feed. Poultry litter has its demerit as it causes pollution in the environment and diseases to human and animals at large, it hobours different microbial species and they can be phosphate solubilizing agent and add nutrient to the soil. This present study is aimed at the bacteriological analysis of poultry manure which was carried out to evaluate the efficacy of poultry droppings for use as an alternative fertilizer. Standard bacteriological methods were used to evaluate four(4) different poultry droppings where the total bacterial count was carried out using pour plate method, after serial dilution of the samples. After culture, the bacterial isolates were microscopically and macroscopically identified. The ability of the bacterial isolate to support plant growth through the solubilization of phosphate was evaluated. The phosphate solubilizing index of the isolate were recorded. The results revealed that mean difference in bacteria count (log₁₀ cfu/g) ranged from 5.48cfu/g in log₁₀ to 6.144cfu/g in log₁₀. The isolated bacteria species include; Morganella, Proteus, Aerobacter, Shigella, Micrococcus, Bacillus, Actinetobacter and Staphylococcus aerus in poultry droppings. The phosphate solubilizing index (PSI) of bacteria isolate revealed that Aerobacter had the highest index of 2.33 followed by Bacillus with an index of 1.67 while Micrococcus and Proteus had the least index of 1.5 respectively.