paghat wrote:
: In article ,
: (Frogleg) wrote:

: On Sun, 16 Mar 2003 11:36:20 GMT, "Anne Middleton/Harold Walker"
: wrote:
:
: If you can help it do not use horse manure.......it is good stuff but very
: weedy.....cow is better......HW
:
: wrote
: Which one is better for my flowers?
:
: Something about a cow's stomach(s), or perhaps its culinary
: preferences, makes cow manure less weedy than horse. Both benefit from
: composting or aging. Choose old over fresh. And don't step...

: If it's properly composted it ain't gonna be weedy. I've even used rabbit
: raisens (which is so poorly digested rabbits will eat what they crapped a
: second time if they can get at it) & though fresh it would sprout weeds,
: composted it does nothing of the sort.

Properly hot composting cow or horse manure (and bedding) is a serious
undertaking and hard to do on a small scale. You have to know what you're
doing, and you have to have the right equipment. If you're stuff's good,
it's taken work to produce and you're for sure not going to be giving it
away.

Most 'composted' manure that will be readily (and freely) available in
quantity to the home gardener looking for local sources will almost
certainly not be hot composted. I would call it 'old manure' instead of
compost ;-) Cold composting takes much longer and will eventually produce
a good, loose soil additive. But I would never use it as mulch and
certainly wouldn't expect much in terms of fertilizer value.

Many, many factors will affect the nutritive value. How fresh is the
manure is when it's collected? Nitrogen is lost very rapidly. Its
moisture content will have a major impact on its ability to reach the
temperatures needed to kill pathogens and weed seeds. Weed seed content
will vary widely depending on pasture maintenance (are weeds allowed to go
to seed?) and hay quality.

I've been working on hot-composting our four-horse output for the last
three years and still can't say I've gotten it right ;-) Last year's
batch cooked for over a year and came out very pretty, fine-textured and
dark. Only this year's spring rains will reveal its weed seed content.
But I am counting more on the fact that we feed good, clean hay and are
fanatical about pasture maintenance than on the success of my amateur
efforts at hot-composting horse manure ;-)

-- Karen

The Garden Gate http://garden-gate.prairienet.org
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