Shop Products
Houzz Logo Print
juliesews

Price of manure

juliesews
10 years ago

So maybe because my husband was a dairy farmer I am just failing to understand the price of manure. We moved from Texas four years ago and now he works for a large dairy that doesn't sell manure or compost. I see on craigslist where manure is $100 a pickup load?!!! That seems like a lot to me! Anything cheaper seems to be over an hour away. Am I just naïve? Should I just give up and buy bagged or pay for the truck load? I live in a brand new subdivision on an acre lot I would like to amend some larger areas with the lasagna gardening method but I need manure and compost... anyone have suggestions? PS I live in Tuttle

Comments (3)

  • elkwc
    10 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Julie that sounds high. Of course I have more than I can use of my own along with lots of loose hay from the haystack. I would think you could find it at a stable or somewhere cheaper. Around here it is 10-20 dollars a load around the bigger towns. I can buy a top quality manure compost and top soil mix for 60 dollars a pick up load. I would look around and maybe even post on craig's list and see what is available.

  • helenh
    10 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Are you sure there is no way to get it where your husband works? Being a dairy farmer you are spoiled. You might have to substitute something else for manure.

    I can't compare because I get it by the scoop at a garden center in Joplin when I get it. The scoop does not fill my small pickup and I think it is $18. I don't buy it any more because of the herbicide issues I've read about here on the Garden Web.

    Is that a delivered to your house price or do you haul it? A big pick up load delivered to your house might approach that amount. Still sounds too high. I would keep looking for sources of organic matter. I planted hairy vetch last fall. I let it shade things that I have just planted because of the late start this year and tomatoes in a holding area too long. When it starts to crowd a plant I cut it by hand. I am using it for sheet composting.

    It may take a while to gather materials grass clippings, leaves in fall, shrub trimmings. 100 dollars a pick load sounds prohibitive to me. I could use many loads. I can get mushroom compost here in my little pickup. I can't really haul enough at a time and it is too high at the garden center. I am thinking of paying a fortune to get a big truck load delivered. My neighbor would haul a trailer load for me but I hate to impose. His wife volunteered him - nice neighbors.

    This post was edited by helenh on Tue, May 28, 13 at 22:28

  • Okiedawn OK Zone 7
    10 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Julie,

    Welcome to the forum.

    That price of $100 per pickup load sounds ridiculously high to me too. At that price, I hope it is fully composted and not still chunky. Even then, there are issues nowadays with herbicide contamination in compost, manure, hay or straw used as mulch, etc. Even municipal compost can be contaminated with herbicide residue because the strong herbicides that are causing the problem sometimes are used to keep golf courses and city parks free of broadleaf weeds.

    We have been blessed to have several ranching neighbors who give us free manure, but because of all the issues in the USA (and Great Britain) since around the year 2000 with persistent herbicide contamination killing garden plants, I rarely use manure any more. Our local ranchers either spray their pastures with the herbicides in question or they buy hay that may have been sprayed with it.

    When someone gives me old spoiled hay, I let it decompose a while before I use it, and I test it for herbicide contamination before I use it. If I still used manure, I'd test it before use as well. To test either hay or compost for herbicide residue, I just put some in paper cups with drainage holes poked in them and plant beans or peas in the material in question. If the plants remain healthy after they sprout, I use the hay or manure. If the beans or peas show herbicide damage within a week or two of sprouting, I let the hay or manure compost for another year before using it. Increasingly I bring in less and less material of an unknown source because the risk of herbicide contamination remains too high. After 15 years of work devoting to turning dense red clay into lovely clayey-loamy soil, it would be devastating to have herbicide contamination make the soil virtually unusable for several years.

    I don't test Black Kow manure because I have used it for well over a decade with no issues and I trust it, but I am cautious with other manure. The issue with Black Kow is that it is pretty pricey, but with it, at least I know I am getting a high-quality manure that never has given me any issues with herbicide contamination.

    A woman who lives near us told me a year or two back that she believes her vegetable garden plot had become contaminated by herbicide residue from either her own hay or the cow manure from her cows. She was resigned to having to create a new veggie garden (luckily, when you live on rural acreage you have the space to build a new garden in a new spot). I hated to hear she was going through that and it is one of the reasons I am so careful about the hay and manure that I do use.

    I rely more on cover crops, green manure crops and composting nowadays for soil improvement than ever before. If the material comes from our property, then I know it doesn't have herbicide residue on it or in it.

    I've linked some info from Mother Earth News that contains the most recent news I've seen on persistent herbicide residue contamination. The letter printed in the DEAR MOTHER column that details one person's experience with killer compost is heart-breaking.

    Dawn

    Here is a link that might be useful: Latest News: Killer Compost/Herbicide Contamination

Sponsored
Landscape Concepts of Fairfax, Inc.
Average rating: 4.8 out of 5 stars17 Reviews
Northern VA's Creative Team of Landscape Designers & Horticulturists