Wednesday, October 26, 2011

The Dung Piles Up

The ever increasing heaps of horse dung are starting to scare me. There's chicken and goat poop in there too, mostly as an amendment with the straw bedding that gets cleaned out of the Coop deVille and The Goatel Carolina.

It is piling up faster than it is decomposing and I want some finished product by the first of March. I think I need to pick a pile and work it. I have been negligent in my turning of the compost. I can also see those wire cages are truly non-functional for turning compost. I should have read a book first.

Oh well. Decomposition happens no matter what.



I have plenty enough dung I think to be able to spread it far and wide. There should be more than enough for the roadside vegetable garden and plenty left over for flowers. And the dung keeps coming.



Just think how lovely all my flowers and other planting will look when they are all covered in dung.



October 26th is eleven days past our average annual first frost date. There has been frost, but it was brief and very spotty. Even the tomatoes and peppers are only halfheartedly froze. I have zinnias still wanting to bloom. That may come to an end this weekend. There's snow in the diagnosis.



I need to get busy and start working those piles of dung. Just think what fun it will be to have steaming heaps of horse dung on cold and snowy winter days.

3 comments:

Lola said...

You are funny. Dung indeed. I can visualize it all. Even the steam from it. It will make a pretty garden.

Barry said...

You are right, the process will happen even in the winter. I suspect just one turning of the "baskets" will suffice until next year, and your flowers will look spectactular. I wish I had room for a few piles, but I chanced upon a tumbler-type composter very recently, needing only rebuilding correctly (previously assembled by a Coors-powered functional illiterate. I need only to balance the C/N ratio, which I have done successfully with the usual 3-bin set-up at my former abode. Hey, best of all, I don't think the bloom thieves will abscond with the various turdiforms.

Lisa at Greenbow said...

Your piles are priceless. I adore those little cyclamen blooms. I have a few here too. They are new to my garden this year and are so sweet.