A review of sulfur nutrition of sugarcane in Queensland

During the 1960s, the use of fertilisers such as sulfate of ammonia and superphosphate with a high sulfur content was replaced by the use of fertilisers such as urea, aqua ammonia and diammonium phosphate with a low sulfur content. This reduced the sulfur application to cane fields from approximately 100 kg/ha to 5 kg/ha each year. Sulfur trials were conducted by BSES officers and reported by Sedl (1971) who concluded that sulfur fertiliser was not necessary for optimum production at that time. Since then, trial work has continued and results are collated in this paper.