LAUSR

Abstract Culturing and using effective microorganisms from locally derived microorganisms has become a common practice employed by farmers throughout Central America as well as parts of South America and Southeast Asia to control foul odors and flies around compost piles and livestock facilities. These local, effective microorganisms (LEM) are applied in a concentrated solution fermented from carbohydrate-rich substrates inoculated with locally-sourced, actively decomposing leaf litter. Despite its growing prevalence among small-scale farmers in some parts of the world, there is little published research that explores the beneficial or detrimental effects of changing the biome of animal-based nutrients and the soils to which LEM are applied. The objectives of this study were to evaluate the effect of combining LEM with swine effluent to fertilize annual ryegrass (Lolium multiflorum) on plant-available nitrogen, nematode community structure, and forage productivity. Forage performance was good across all of the treatments – with relative feed quality (RFQ) values above 200 and 100 in the March and May harvests respectively. In the first, second and third sampling dates, soils from 0 to 5 cm depth showed more nitrogen mineralized in LEM-treated soils than in control soils (p = 0.178, p