Abstract
The palatability of rice produced on Andosol has been reported to be inferior to that of rice produced on the other soil types, such as Brown Lowland soil. The effects of zeolite application on the nitrogen and mineral contents and palatability of rice were studied in order to improve the eating-quality of rice grown on Andosol. The content of silicic acid in rice straw produced on Andosol was slightly increased with zeolite application. On the other hand, the contents of Ca, Mg, K and N in the rice straw were constant. With zeolite application to Andosol, the N content of milled rice was decreased and the palatability of milled rice had no clear difference as compared to that grown in Brown Lowland soil. The percentage of ripened grains was increased in spite of an increase in the number of unhulled rice per square meter. These results lead to the conclusion that the improvement of palatability of rice produced on Andosol with zeolite application could be attributed to the decrease in N content of milled rice due to the increase of the percentage of ripened grains.
