Manure?

[desertlady]

After this fall comes I usually pull out all the dead plants out of my garden and start throwing in compose and chicken poop. I was wondering what animal waste do well in my garden ? My neighbor got horses, cattle and goats. Ive got chickens. I was thinking mix all of them ? is thats too much ?? :/

 

[Carol Dee]

We had a problem with horse manure once. Lots of Weed Seed that must not get digested. Anyway.... lots of weed.

 

[desertlady]

We had a problem with horse manure once. Lots of Weed Seed that must not get digested. Anyway.... lots of weed.

probably from mixed hay that has weeds too.

 

[silkiechicken]

Got pony poop once. It was also filled with weed seeds. Chicken poop is what I use, but that's because I have those. LOL

 

[desertlady]

Ok No Horsie poop for me ! I dont want to be pulling weeds all summer !!

 

[catjac1975]

We use chicken and horse and have a beautiful garden. We put raw horse manure with bedding in the fall and till it in in the spring. I guess there is a lot of weed seed but, I think there would be weeds anyway.

 

[Ridgerunner]

One way for nature to spread sees is for animals to eat them and only digest a few. They drop the weed and grass seeds wherever they wander. You can get a whole lot of weed and grass seeds with cow and horse manure. I'm not familiar with goat manure but I'd suspect they would be guilty too. Just look them in the face. Don't they look guilty?

My neighbor gives me two front-end-loader buckets full of partially rotted cow manure most years. It does have a whole lot of seeds but I still consider it gold.

If you want to reduce the weed and grass seeds, hot compost it.

 

[thistlebloom]

Everybody can correct me if I'm wrong on this one, but I thought ruminants did not pass weed seeds. Since they regurgitate and rechew their forage, weed seeds don't survive. I also thought the rumen in their gut had something to do with that.

I agree with Cat, you're always going to get weeds anyway from somewhere, even the wind blows them in, so why not take whatever manure you can get and have great soil.

 

[Dave2000]

Add in this order: Chicken, cow, goat, horse. Stop when your field is full of poo Avoid goat and horse if possible, their digestive tracts don't digest seeds as well.

 

[Smiles Jr.]

I use cow, chicken, and rabbit manure only. I have had bad results with horse, goat, and donkey manures and weeds. Luckily I have a buddy who has 100 to 150 rabbits and each year I get a couple of truck loads for my compost piles. He also has cows and delivers a small dump truck full of poop every summer. My paltry poultry contribution isn't much but it also goes on the compost piles along with grass clippings, kitchen waste, and lots of ground up branches and leaves in the fall. I used to have a restaurant supply me with coffee grounds and egg shells but that became too much work so I quit. I just recently came upon an endless supply of chopped straw so that will be another ingredient in my compost.

One thing that I insist on, with my compost, is that it be at least two years old before I use it. About once a year I use the loader on the tractor to tune the piles over but I'm not very good at remembering to turn it. Most of the time it's three years old, black powder, and odorless by the time I spread it. I have not purchased any fertilizer in about 15 years. I love compost.