littleminnie
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Gardening should be fun.
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Post by littleminnie on Oct 29, 2013 22:40:32 GMT -5
I am still small enough in size to use manure as my main fertilizer, along with compost. I continue to experiment with what crops like and when they want it applied. Many people are down on horse manure but I have come to love it. Weed seeds are heavy in my soil so I can't really tell the difference from adding manure. But I will say that often people think horse has more viable weed seeds but I don't think so. Any animal manure piled up and allowed to collect weeds and have them go to seed, or the municipal compost pile of the same condition, will introduce weed seeds. Horse manure often just has oats and hay seed in it which is very easy to deal with. Some cow manure I got a couple years ago had a lot of pigweed growing in the pile and introduced some of that. But to me with fields of weeds going to seed around me it doesn't matter. I consider weeds to be the base of my compost pile! Also horse manure is easier to till in vs. cow manure. My favorite type of manure is pure horse, without shavings. I have a friend with 3 horses that cleans up her paddocks into a big pile of pure manure. This stuff is gold for onions and loved by corn and brassicas too. Of course I like to get it in fall and plant in it in spring. So those crops need the richest manure I can give them. The next group is cucurbits and greens. If I can get stall cleanings or cow manure I give it to the cucurbits. For the nightshades I like to give them lighter manure or good compost. Also beets, sweet potatoes, and brassica roots can handle this. Lastly, carrots get plain compost. Lettuce, scallions, fennel, parsnips, legumes, arugula etc, all those get compost. It is important not to give some fruiting crops and some root crops too much nitrogen. Peppers and carrots especially. This year I got some fresh and not very rich, I thought, stall cleanings of horses and goats and put it on my sweet potato area being that was last to be planted. It wasn't even disced in very well but the sweet potatoes did awesome. So yesterday I dumped the same stuff on next year's sweet potato area and I am getting more real soon. As much as can be put down in fall is best. It is very important though to do soil tests and see what you need. And of course don't use fresh manure on crops to be eaten in the near future or raw. I recommend asking questions about the manure you are offered or at least having different options of what to do with it after you see it. Do not put the highest N manures like chicken or rabbit or sheep on tomatoes and peppers if you don't want all leaves. Those would be good for corn, brassicas and melons and squash.
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izzy
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Post by izzy on Oct 30, 2013 1:23:06 GMT -5
Hi Minnie, It's nice to hear from you; been reading your posts for many years now, and have learned lots from your experiences. Thank you for sharing your knowledge, and especially pictures of your trials and successes.
After a lifetime of city living and backyard gardening, I've moved to the country and loving it! But ...... it's a whole new learning curve. Sitting in front of the computer reading about manure seems easy enough, yet I'm hesitant. What questions do you ask when sourcing a new find? With all the reading of persistent weed killers, do you encounter any manure that has damaged your fields for an entire season? I want to be sure I know what I'd be dealing with in perennial beds and all the veggies I consume raw. There's not much in the way of manure piles around here; but if I find a source nearby, I might take the plunge. Odd as it may sound, I struggled with making a choice to use animal manures as an input because I don't eat meat - but those horses and cows are vegetarian too.
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littleminnie
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Gardening should be fun.
Posts: 264
Joined: February 2011
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Post by littleminnie on Oct 30, 2013 17:24:45 GMT -5
The sort of farmers I have gotten manure from do not use pesticides. I ask how old the pile is, how much they have, where it came from, is it stall cleanings or something else, and whether they have used it in their own garden. And obviously what animals it came from.
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Post by paquebot on Nov 4, 2013 3:09:39 GMT -5
Manure from any farm animal is good but one should wonder why. The animals eat feed and remove a certain percentage of the NPK value. Try to explain that to those who only know of the 2 ends of an animal. Organic matter goes in one end and comes out the other. Since what comes out must be a concentrated form of what went in, it must be better. Wrong! Much of the nitrogen was extracted to maintain the blood. Phosphorus was extracted for the bones. Potassium was used to build muscles and other meat. Some animals may be more or less efficient in that process but still none can match tilling in the material before it's been used by a higher entity.
Martin
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Post by horsea on Nov 4, 2013 12:05:58 GMT -5
That is not a bad way of looking at it, Martin. Right away I thought that it's like the difference between us humans eating mainly plant food VS flesh foods. Possibly I'm missing something here, 'cause I know it's not exactly the same. I guess if we want really rich fertilizer our best bet would be to gather a bunch of dead animals (small ones are easier!), bury them, let this sit for a few years, then dig up what's there, put these partly rotted corpses thru a grinder and place this in or on our soil. THEN things will really grow! This soil additive will be far more concentrated in many nutrients than the little bit we get from the rear end of an animal.
Indeed, me mum would tell me that when you plant a fruit tree, throw a fish or two in the hole (we had fish in our nearby stream). I got the clever idea to try the same in the garden. BAD idea. My friendly local skunk made short work of that garden bed...
In any case, unless someone else gives info to the contrary, I now see animal manure in a different way as regards gardening. However, there is always the issue of organic matter. It's not just nutrients. If we have, easily available to us, a growing pile of manure, I say, put it in the garden but don't knock yourselves out paying good money for it or hauling it from a distance.
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Post by Laura_in_FL on Nov 4, 2013 13:15:56 GMT -5
That makes sense, Martin. And Horsea, there is nothing wrong with recycling critters into soil when appropriate. That's what happens in the wild anyway. A few years back my cat died and I buried her at the dripline of one of my apple trees. That tree has been gloriously lush ever since. When I killed a rat in my yard last winter, it went under the drip line of the orange tree. It probably wasn't solely due to that one rat, but my orange tree is bent down to the ground with oranges this year.
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Post by paquebot on Nov 4, 2013 14:39:09 GMT -5
The entire world ecosystem is based on 100% recycling of all nutrients and minerals. Were it not, we would be walking on dinosaur bones and dung many miles thick. Even our own life form is still recycled in some primitive societies. Everyone here already knows the importance of blood meal and bone meal as fertilizers. When I had large compost piles, the largest totally consumed 7 deer heads and other offal in less than a year. I have a large compost tumbler and fair game for disposal of any small animal or bird. I get all the same benefits of blood meal and bone meal with the added bonus of potassium from the flesh.
Martin
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Post by horsea on Nov 4, 2013 15:33:18 GMT -5
A few years back my cat died and I buried her at the dripline of one of my apple trees. That tree has been gloriously lush ever since.
No kidding! My dear cat Daisy was buried at the dripline of my decorative apple tree! And it is highly productive, healthy and trouble-free. We can't eat these sour little apples but some birds do.
*********
I'd never use slaughterhouse products in my garden, though, even if you gave it to me for nothing. Something ugly about it all, as opposed to all the small corpses I find on our rural property which make it onto a waste pile which I then ignore for about 5 years. But when I find dead deer, left to die by incompetent hunters, I leave the corpse there to be consumed by something or other. I then remove the skull to decorate my garden fence.
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Post by paquebot on Nov 5, 2013 2:17:58 GMT -5
Yes, the idea of slaughterhouse waste may seem revolting but it's natural. That's one of the fertilizers used by a number of farmers in my area. It's brought to the farm in tanker trucks and then pumped to applicators in the field. The material is knifed in about a foot deep. Saw it done last spring in a field where a number of homes in a small village have their lawns stop at a bean or corn field. If one only knew what it was, one could envision a smell worse than burning inedibles for tankage. However, when properly applied and no spills, no smells. Wasn't always that case when it used to be sprayed and then plowed under. If there were a few days delay from start to finish, every seagull in the state would converge on it and there would be more varieties of carrion flies than many ever knew existed. I did, in fact, enjoy a lot of sweet corn from a field which got that treatment this past spring. That was about 40 acres for a local canning company and the only fertilizer used. I suspect that next year will have yellow snap beans in that field and again will probably need little fertilizer if any at all.
In other parts of the country, the same applies to poultry waste. We don't have many big operations around here but I heard that that smell was 10 times worse than pig offal if not knifed in. (Since butchering chickens was never my favorite chore, I believe it!) The only one within a 50-mile radius of me keeps it all and composts it. When they began selling their compost and guaranteeing an NPK analysis which was impossible with just bedding and droppings, didn't take me long to figure out where the high numbers came from. It's the feathers and other offal!
Martin
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Post by paquebot on Nov 5, 2013 2:55:08 GMT -5
Back to original topic, my favorite is horse manure since it always seems to be available within just a few miles. One nearby boarding stable will even deliver 5 yards for $60 within a 25-mile or so radius. I know that only good-quality local hay is fed and that there is virtually no chance of introducing a weed which isn't already here. That can not be said for any commercial compost or topsoil. I consider horse manure as the most convenient way to use the nutrients which are stored in hay and with the best rate of return. I could mulch my gardens with a bale of hay and wait a full season for it to break down or I could feed it to a horse and till it in a week or so later. The horse does take a lot of NPK value out of the hay but the less-nutritious manure is much easier to work with. Here, my son and I maintain a total of roughly 100 pigeons between our dual loft complex. They do a great job of converting grains and other feed to very rich fertilizer. I could dump 40# of Canadian field peas on my garden and till them in and wait for them to break down to release their nutrients. Or, I could pass them through the pigeons and make everything available at once. Combined with the rest of their diet plus ability to produce a lot of nitrogen in the form of urea, it's definitely a no-brainer as to how best to use whatever pigeons eat. It's no small wonder that pigeons were the very first "fertilizer factories" built thousands of years ago as dovecotes. They were gleaner birds which went out to fill their crops with food during the day and then digest and excrete it during the night. Mother Nature definitely knew what she was doing when she designed them and Man was able to recognize it!
Martin
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Post by redneckplanter on Nov 13, 2013 9:19:06 GMT -5
covering three quarters of an acre with well over 40 truckloads of manure and 5-6000 bags of leaves has gotten me in better shape. after a year or so a few observations... is it helping the soil? most definitely. is it quick to break down cold composting? rotfl nooooooooooooooooo. does it kill out the weeds? even here in texas a 5-6 foot tall windrow will choke out weeds. as I prep raised beds in this area for rootcrops? I note that I must dig down a foot to a foot and a half through the organics rotting in above the gumbo. I have to slice it with the shovel and flip it.break it up some. a mixed plug of jet black and striated browns.rich smelling.gorgeous.not quite ready...but niiiiiiiiiiice. as I mentioned to linn...my own observation...you can get it too thick around yer trees and nuke em.and it can hold too much water...believe it or not...... I expect its usable fer the root crops and transplants. probly another year or so till its ''ready ready''.. fwiw garrett
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Post by redneckplanter on Nov 13, 2013 9:27:54 GMT -5
the few options I have as I see it are flip it all under by shovel...... and start all over.... or let it keep rotting in place and add supplemental compost from my new mega pile in the back property next season as I need to.
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Post by paquebot on Nov 15, 2013 0:31:12 GMT -5
On real heavy soil, doesn't matter how deep the material is piled, it will never go down into the soil. That's why topsoil is so shallow in many woods even after 10,000 years of leaves falling on it. Red's finding that all that good stuff is sitting on top and planting in it is like planting in a container. What isn't taken into consideration is that the more that is added means more weight on the soil and hence more compaction. In time, one could make it 2' thick humus but still would not solve the deep root penetration.
Martin
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Post by redneckplanter on Nov 17, 2013 13:06:18 GMT -5
2 feet of humus would rock...smiles i'll keep at it.if nothing else super rich mulch/compost and planting bed fodder.
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Post by paquebot on Nov 18, 2013 1:30:10 GMT -5
Yes, keep at it and eventually it may become just like one huge container filled with potting soil. ¾-acre is a lot of surface area but it can be done. You'd have to aim for about 2' to allow for good root growth. Although 18" would be fine, the extra 6" would be insurance against being too wet if the soil base is heavy. What you may want to do since it's a big enough area, and assumed to be without a lot of boulders, is to have it ripped. Find some farmer with a subsoil plow and he can rip it over 2' deep. Won't put a lot of humus that deep immediately but will allow it to work down later. Then you'd be set for life with beautiful soil!
Martin
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Post by redneckplanter on Nov 18, 2013 21:32:53 GMT -5
well at the moment I am fiendishly planting garlic in mega raised compost beds. making em 3 or so feet tall and 2 feet or so wide. a gorgeous blend of manure and rotting leaves.dunno how 4 lbs of rojo and 5 lbs of german garlic will do but rolling the dice.the consistency is fine enough that I added some bulbuils in thar too.lol conventional wisdom states hardnecks won't roll this far south...smiles but I have never been a conventional kinda guy...lol
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Post by Laura_in_FL on Nov 19, 2013 9:45:50 GMT -5
The only Rojo garlic I know of is Ajo Rojo, which is a Creole-type. Is that what you have? If so, you are in luck, because Creoles should do well in your climate. If you have a different Rojo, then I don't know.
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Post by paquebot on Nov 19, 2013 23:33:04 GMT -5
Ajo Roja was originally thought to be a Creole but is not. It's an unclassified strain with Spanish origins. It also is not Spanish Roja which is a rocambole.
Martin
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Post by Laura_in_FL on Nov 20, 2013 9:46:10 GMT -5
Interesting, thank you. Well, Creole or not, I hope Ajo Rojo likes North Florida, because I got some of it in the "warm winter sampler" I bought.
Garrett, do you know which Rojo you have?
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Post by paquebot on Nov 20, 2013 14:20:55 GMT -5
Most garlic varieties with Mediterranean origins are softneck types. Creoles and a few others represent the transition zone between there and North Europe and Asia. It's where the odd ones come from which don't fit into the normal classifications. They also would do well in a similar climate in this continent and thus well-suited for our South.
Martin
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Post by redneckplanter on Nov 20, 2013 14:26:47 GMT -5
The only Rojo garlic I know of is Ajo Rojo, which is a Creole-type. Is that what you have? If so, you are in luck, because Creoles should do well in your climate. If you have a different Rojo, then I don't know. it's just Spanish rojo linn. I think paquebot is right..the one I got is definitely a hardneck.smiles
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Post by redneckplanter on Nov 20, 2013 14:27:47 GMT -5
Most garlic varieties with Mediterranean origins are softneck types. Creoles and a few others represent the transition zone between there and North Europe and Asia. It's where the odd ones come from which don't fit into the normal classifications. They also would do well in a similar climate in this continent and thus well-suited for our South. Martin thanks paquebot..... preciate ya's...smiles
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materman
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Post by materman on Nov 20, 2013 20:14:43 GMT -5
I don't use horse manure until it is compost itself. I have a location that they only feed pesticide free hay, but it is mixed with sawdust as a bedding. I take the skid loader over at least once a year and turn the pile so as to speed up the composting process. After a couple years it is ready for me to use for the garden or my potting soil. Stuff really works great. Here is a pic of the load I used up this spring.
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littleminnie
Pro Member
Gardening should be fun.
Posts: 264
Joined: February 2011
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Post by littleminnie on Nov 20, 2013 20:27:09 GMT -5
I'm off to get some cow manure in the morning. Hopefully 3 loads before the farmer has to quit.
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Post by paquebot on Nov 21, 2013 2:45:51 GMT -5
Main problem with cow manure is the amount of salt which it may contain. That's one which definitely should be aged if it's going to be tilled into the soil. It has 3 to 4 times the percentage of salt as horse manure. Normally it is not a problem in light soils but takes a long time to leach out in heavy soils.
Martin
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Post by redneckplanter on Dec 1, 2013 9:48:45 GMT -5
filling in the middle garden now....
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billh
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Post by billh on Jan 8, 2014 22:13:26 GMT -5
I get all the cow manure I can use from a dairyman friend, He cleans his feed lots every day and the stuff is piled up as big as a house and it's also 3 to 4 years old. In the last 3 years I've tilled in probably 9 trailer loads weighing 3000lbs. 0n about 2400 square ft. of garden, it has helped my clay soil greatly. This past fall I layerd oak and maple leaves along with pine straw and straw bedding with this manure mixed it all together with a tiller and will use it for mulch this coming season. I did a soil test and everything is pretty high which worried me, but I had a great garden so I guess I'll keep going.
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Post by coppice on Jan 18, 2014 9:40:06 GMT -5
I think Red should salt his leaf piles with a little soil. And I think the barrier is not as immutable between top soil and sub soil.
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