Hot Poop!

Kassaundra

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All my gardening life I have heard chicken poop is way to hot to put in the garden near plants unless it has been composted or aged. Over the past couple of years I have done some limited experimenting w/o any problems. Well this year I threw caution to the wind and filled my raised beds w/ chicken poop straight from the coop and planted plants and seeds right in it. Everything looks amazing, no damage at all.

I feed my chickens fermented grains which allows for more complete digestion, so not sure if that is why it is working for me or not, just glad it is working.
 

Nyboy

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I remember reading a book years ago where author had same though on horse manure. Her horse was a escape artist and always ended up in flower garden, she notice flowers the horse pooped right on top of where fine.
 

digitS'

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Dad used the blade on the tractor to clean the corrals every spring.

The corral elevation would drop at least a foot! One year, I think there was a problem with the manure spreader. Rather than carrying it out on the fields. He leveled the pile, ran a plow through it, put up an electric fence, and planted a garden.

Lush foliage, intensely green - the plants had an amazing start. Then, the weather turned hot and dry. We got busy so that we could flood the garden with irrigation water.

It all began to compost and ... Wow! That was it for those vegetables. Cooked.

Consistent moisture should keep things on an even keel, Kassandra. Allowing the garden to dry out and then watering might kick it into a high rev. Things may or may not grow well on a compost pile.

Steve
 

catjac1975

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All my gardening life I have heard chicken poop is way to hot to put in the garden near plants unless it has been composted or aged. Over the past couple of years I have done some limited experimenting w/o any problems. Well this year I threw caution to the wind and filled my raised beds w/ chicken poop straight from the coop and planted plants and seeds right in it. Everything looks amazing, no damage at all.

I feed my chickens fermented grains which allows for more complete digestion, so not sure if that is why it is working for me or not, just glad it is working.
We put chicken poop straight onto the garden where we plant corn. It is tilled under in early spring and it sits until it is warm enough to plant the corn-early May. Never have had a problem. It is spread into a big area but it is a pretty good amount of manure. The chickens also roam the garden all winter leaving their waste where they may. Our corn is great. We are going to try to cordon off the corn from the rest of the garden plants, with a chicken access door for them to wander among the plants. We will wait until when they are pretty big. Wouldn't be nice if they did the weeding?
 

baymule

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At my old house I filled the coop and run with leaves and let the chickens compost it for me. It went from 3 feet to about 8 inches, then I dug it out and put it straight on the garden. It never burned anything.
 

Beekissed

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I did that one year, K, and I had the most lush, dark green, huge and lovely tomato vines that year.....but very little fruit. The green peppers did really well that year and the corn was good, squash was great, onions were exceptional...but those maters didn't do much at all.
 

Kassaundra

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Garden is looking great now, you can almost watch the tomatoes grow, they are blooming so hopefully won't be all plant. I will keep in mind not letting it dry out
 

Ridgerunner

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I have burned tomatoes with chicken poop. I put the bedding containing some fresh manure in the rows between the tomatoes but got too close on a couple. They turned yellow and were stunted. I finally just took them out.

When I clean out the coop I do it in winter and spread it in the garden. When it's time to plant stuff it's broken down. I've never had any problem doing this. It does make a big difference the next year too, nutrients and tilth. I probably should clean the coop every year instead of every three or four years. The garden would probably appreciate it. Maybe next winter.

I had a neighbor's cow get out a few weeks ago and leave some deposits in the yard. It kind of burns the grass to start with though that may be smothering it more than burning it. Once it breaks down a bit those areas are bright green lush growth compared to the other grass. Horses work the same way. If you see a bright green mound of grass in a pasture, that's where a cow or horse unloaded a while back and it has had time to break down.

Dad would clean out the barn of cow and horse manure in the fall and spread it on the hay fields. We'd load the wagon bed with pitchforks but at least he had a manure spreader attachment to put on the wagon.

When Dad would plant squash he'd dig a hole, put a shovelful of chicken manure in it, fill it with dirt and heap up a mound of dirt over it, then plant the squash seeds. By the time the squash toots got down there the manure had broken down and fed the squash. it's kinda like burying a fish when you plant corn.

I think part of it is how much the manure has broken down versus how much is still fresh. Chicken manure is hotter than cow or horse too. How much bedding you have mixed with it can make a difference too. From experience fresh chicken manure can burn some plants, but sometimes there is a lot of difference in "can" and "will".
 

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