Abstract
Nowadays, recycling wastes to compost has become the safe way and suitable options for disposal the huge amount of agricultural wastes, which are produced now with expected economic and environmental profits. Therefore, understanding the factors affecting in composting process is basic for producing good and high quality compost. The present study has been focused on physical, chemical and biological factors that occurs during composting process using different agricultural wastes mixed with three different types of manures as activators i.e., poultry litter, cow and mixture of sheep and camel manures. Special attention has been paid to the relevance of pH; EC; temperature; CO2 concentration; organic carbon (%); NH4 (ppm); NO3 (ppm); C:N ratio; changes in total macro and micro-nutrients and oxygen levels during composting process and the necessity of standardizing the maturity indices due to their great importance amongst compost quality criteria. Microbiological changes during composting process were also considered. Results revealed that agricultural waste which treated with 10% poultry manure registered rapid degradation than the two other manures and recorded the least bacterial counts, while the treatment of agricultural waste +10% mixture of camel and sheep manure as organic activator gave the highest bacterial counts and higher EC than either treated with cow or poultry manure. Finally, all these parameters are considered as a good indicator for the end of the biodegradation phase in which the compost achieves maturity.