Instant compost

[Jed]

Here's an easy compost to make. I can buy plastic shopping bags of horse poo from the sides of the road here. The horse people need to clean their paddocks regularly to ensure the health of their horses from not getting worms.
So bags are a regular sight in the country. Straw is the other ingredient which I use because it's pretty much weed free. Then you will need fresh grass clippings from a lawn that was recently mown.
Find yourself an area and containment to make the compost. Put down a thick bed of loose straw then cover with 3 or 4 bags of poo and then a thin layer of grass clippings. Water well and then start the procedure over again. Do about 6 to 8 layers of each remembering that water. Cover with plastic and wait for two days. Check that it's getting hot. It should be 158F / 70C which is very hot. All is well and you can leave it as long as you wish. The heat will do the rest. No turning is required. You can use it once it cools down a little and put it around plants as a mulch to give them warmth.The earth worms love it and you will find thousands if you build your pile directly over soil.
Happy Gardening.

 

[Becky]

Nice tip Jed! Does it smell much or is it ok?

 

[Jed]

Nice tip Jed! Does it smell much or is it ok?

Not at all. Straw seems to have a cleansing affect. If you've ever used it in your poultry house on top of old litter it smells so sweet. In days of old, straw was often used in the home under carpets and swept out in spring taking all the dirt and dust with it. It was replaced with fresh harvested straw which helped freshen up the home.
Also not using food scraps ensures it doesn't have that fermented rotten smell. I prefer not to use food scraps in open compost heaps as it attracts mice and rats. Compost tumblers are better for that.

 

[kate23]

Wow, that is a really neat tip! I knew horse mulch could be used as fertilizer but I never thought of using it for an instant compost heap. The earthworms part is especially great - I want to have an earthworm farm for my garden. I don't have any horses (yet - I hope to have some eventually) but there's plenty of people on Craigslist that give horse poop away by the tons so it shouldn't be hard to find at all.

 

[maddie]

Horse poop? Where do I get it from? I was so hopeful when I read the title that I could make some instant fertilizer with easily available stuff. However, this sounds like it is easy to make provided you have all the ingredients.
I make my own compost with coffee grounds, tea leaves and vegetable peels. I just put then in covered compost bins with alternate layers of soil. I then roll them around once a fortnight and use it after six to eight months.

 

[Jed]

Horse poop? Where do I get it from? .

You could start with referring to a telephone book and seeing if there are any horse riding schools near by or stables of some kind. Generally horse owners are happy to get rid of horse droppings. Stables have straw available saturated with urine but I prefer to get hold of the other stuff.

 

[maddie]

I will check it out Jed. In the city these maybe hard to find. There is a huge farm in a town nearby, there are hundreds of cows there, would cow poop work?
Sometimes I really wish we lived on a farm. Sigh!

 

[Jed]

Yes cow poop is fine.Fresh is best as it still has a lot of nitrogen in it and it heats up a compost pile faster. It is much heavier and messy though. If you can only get mostly dry pats that's okay, lighter,easier to bag up and less stinkier and because the drying process release nitrates it can be spread on top of the garden without affecting plants with too much ammonia nitrate. So if its easier to access and take home dry manure, that's great. Another bonus of cow manure is if it's sourced from known paddocks that grow wild edible mushrooms you may be taking home mushroom spore that could take root in your garden beds if conditions are right.Ensure though the mushrooms are edible first.

 

[justusforus]

Horse poop? Where do I get it from? I was so hopeful when I read the title that I could make some instant fertilizer with easily available stuff. However, this sounds like it is easy to make provided you have all the ingredients.
I make my own compost with coffee grounds, tea leaves and vegetable peels. I just put then in covered compost bins with alternate layers of soil. I then roll them around once a fortnight and use it after six to eight months.

Check Craiglist in the rural areas near where you live. Many offer it in the "Free" section. One local farmer here bags it and mixes it with sawdust and calls it "garden candy".

 

[Pat]

Nice idea, we have a riding stable down the street, I may go over to see if I can get some of their manure for the yard. I will need straw to keep the smell down, I don't want my neighbors to throw rotten tomatoes at me.