chicken poop- too hot?

[laurenlulu]

I've heard some people like to put chicken poop in the holes with their veggies when transplanting, and for using as a fertilizer. I just bought some of that Miracle Gro organic stuff- its mostly pelleted chicken manure. I've got plenty of poo, I could have saved my money!

But my question is, will fresh chicken poop burn up my roots if I put it in the holes.. or anywhere? Does it have to be fully composted?

How about goat manure? My neighbor's have goats

 

[wyoweed]

I just read up on this! The way I understand it is: Chicken is considered hot over other manures because of the high nitrogen content. The way it breaks down is. The ammonium in chicken is available immediately to the plants. Other kinds break down slowly.
I use the chicken as a top treatment or light mulch. The others I would work into the soil so it could start decomposing.
Goat manure would be a really good one to use right away. I've also heard that bat guano is fantastic to throw into the holes when planting.

 

[patandchickens]

The stuff you bought is *dried composted* chicken manure, not quite entirely the same thing as what comes direclty out of your coop But absolutely it makes sense to compost yours and then use it.

I would totally not put fresh chicken poo into planting holes. There are a few things it will work for -- basically the squash/melon family -- but most things will do poorly or even croak.

The closer it is, to the younger roots, in larger quantities, the more important it is to use longer-composted poo. I'd also be extra careful around things you want to be long-lived, like trees.

Goat manure is by reputation less hot and you have a larger margin of error with it when used fresh. I haven't used it myself. Although I have gardened on what in past years had been a vast goat manure pile, and have picked potatoes and raspberries from another old goat pile site, and BOY OH BOY that was the best gardening I've ever known. (The soil was otherwise rather sandy)

Good luck, have fun,

Pat