COMPOST QUALITY AND NITROGEN MINERALIZATION DYNAMICS DURING THE MATURITY STAGE OF LAVENDER WASTE COMPOST

The interest of Romanian small farmers in lavender cropping is increasing. Many of them have also developed lavender processing lines so that the small industry around this species is growing. Additionally, the amounts of generated waste have also increased, but many arguments support the composting of this waste: good management of organic matter in the circular economy, identification of beneficial effects of compost, other than those known about composts obtained from biodegradable waste, etc. In our studies we composted lavender waste together with manure from small ruminants (sheep and goats). Both lavender waste and manure were collected from several small farms in Southern Romania, and the composting process was carried out in a system of 3 paddocks within also a small ecological farm. In addition to the evolution of the composting process and its parameters, the dynamics of nitrogen mineralization were analyzed. The compost reached the stage of maturity after 4 months of composting, and during the maturation the dynamics of nitrogen (N) mineralization were evaluated, and the physicochemical properties and the phytotoxicity of the resulting compost were also analyzed.