Fertilizers are widely used for the growth of crops in agriculture. These are very essential material for many crops. They have been used in agriculture since time immemorial.
Fertilizers provide some nutritional elements for the growth of plants. These are typically phosphorus, nitrogen, potassium, magnesium, calcium and sulfur. The first three elements are called primary plant nutrients and the latter three are called secondary. They also provide some other trace elements apart from these nutrients.
The fertilizers can either be organic or inorganic. Organic fertilizers are carbon based whereas the inorganic fertilizers are based on inorganic chemical elements.
Fertilizers can be produced either by composting as a naturally occurring process in nature or by the involvement of humans and thereby adding cost with chemical processes.
There are also two types of fertilizers called macronutrient type of fertilizers and micronutrient type. These are decided based upon the concentration the different nutrients present in the plants which have grown from utilizing these fertilizers. These plants are dried before calculating the concentration of nutrients. The macronutrient fertilizers contain the before mentioned six nutrients to a large extent. Copper, Nickel, Boron, Zinc, Iron, Manganese, Chlorine, Molybdenum etc. make micronutrient type of fertilizers.
The application of fertilizer has side effects of increased pests, degrading ecosystems etc. To avoid these problems the knowledge of nutrient composition in fertilizers is essential for a given application.
