Effects of Composting Yard Waste Temperature on Seed Germination of a Major Tropical Invasive Weed, Leucaena leucocephala

Min Pan, Ling Chui Hui, Caroline Man Yee Law, Sen Mei Auyeung

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

3 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Composting is an environmental-friendly option for yard waste management, and produces products for improving soil quality. However, there is a weed dispersal risk if the compost contains many active weed seeds. This study assessed the potential of composting in minimizing the seed germination of a major tropical invasive weed, Leucaena leucocephala. The germination of the species was tested after two different sets of thermal treatments, i.e., (1) different constant temperatures (20 °C, 30 °C, 40 °C, 50 °C, 60 °C, and 70 °C) for 5 days, and (2) composting temperature (simulating the temperature profile of a typical composting process) for 60 days. A three-month growth test was further conducted for the seeds treated with the composting temperature. The seeds were present either alone (N-seeds) or mixed with wood chips (W-seeds) when thermally treated. A constant temperature treatment of 70 °C suppressed the seed germination to a low rate. For the composting temperature treatment, the germination percentage of the N-seeds and W-seeds were reduced from around 60% to 22.7% and 12.7%, respectively. This preliminary study suggested that the temperature should reach as high as 70 °C in the composting process to guarantee the suppression of the germination of the seeds of L. leucocephala, particularly when the seeds are contained within seed pods during composting.

Original languageEnglish
Article number13638
JournalSustainability (Switzerland)
Volume14
Issue number20
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Oct 2022

Keywords

  • Leucaena leucocephala
  • compost
  • invasive species
  • seed germination
  • temperature effect
  • yard waste

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