Abstract

Use of suitable plants to extract and concentrate excess phosphorus (P) from contaminated soil serves as an attractive method of phyto-remediation. Plant species vary considerably in their potential to assimilate different organic and inorganic P substrates. Duo grass (a hybrid of Lolium × Festuca) seedlings were grown in liquid nutrient media supplemented with various concentrations of potassium dihydrogen phosphate (KH₂PO₄) and phytate to study their P-accumulation potential. Plants that received extra P showed significantly greater plant biomass and accumulated more shoot P compared to the plants that were supplied with normal P. Duo was also grown in poultry manure amended soil and liquid media to evaluate their ability to grow and accumulate biomass in poultry manure impacted soils. Thus this grass species may be utilized as a P hyper-accumulator for phyto-extraction of excess P into their biomass from soils. Duo grass can utilize both organic (phytate), as well as, inorganic P from the growth medium as evidenced in the results.

Key words: Duo grass, phosphorus, phosphorus substrates, phytate, phosphorus accumulation, phytoremediation.

Abbreviation

KH₂PO₄, Potassium dihydrogen phosphate; K₂SO_4, potassium sulphate; P, phosphorus.