Glorious Poop

Well, okay, maybe glorious is a stretch, even for farm geeks.  

However, this week we are busy fertilizing and adding nutrients back into the soil and are grateful for small blessings.  We're doing this in a variety of organic ways and each offers different results.

One of the major jobs of having farm animals is dealing with copious amount of poop. Cows and Chickens and Piggies eat a lot and poop a lot.  We work hard to keep the animal's areas free of poop not just to keep it clean, but by doing so, it helps keep smells, flies and parasites at bay. Because our animals are all grazers, if their dropping are left on the grass, there is more chance of the animals ingesting parasites and this is why so many animals are loaded up with pesticides to rid them of what could have been prevented.  

The benefits of poop-gathering is that after it's collected, aged and broken down - courtesy of worms, sun and water - we're left with a rich compost and fertilizer. Aged cow manure is used in the garden beds as it makes a rich humus that the plants love and helps add back in bulky organic matter.  The chicken droppings are mixed in with pine shavings and after they are aged are spread out on the field, they boost the nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus.

We're also experimenting with adding kelp meal to our pastures to bump up the mineral content of the soil as water and erosion can deplete micro-nutrients that are required for a healthy pasture.  Healthy pastures = healthy animals.

And lastly, we are experimenting with comfrey tea as a green manure.  Our Russian Comfrey plants are quite prolific.  Their blooms feed the bees and their long roots mine minerals and nutrients from deep in the soil .  By cutting their leaves and soaking them in buckets of water for a couple weeks, we are left with a "tea" to apply to garden to boost silica, calcium, iron, magnesium, nitrogen and potassium levels.

While scoopin' poop is not my favorite job on the farm, I'm reminded that like most things in life, we have the resources we need right at our feet - we just have to be willing to use them.