"Farm1" please@askifyouwannaknow wrote in message
...

If it's all very old and a uniform brown colour and in biggish
horizontal sheets (that's how it compacts down when old) then it is OK
to use like that, but you have to break it up a bit and compacted chok
shit in sheets can be hard to brek up. However, if it is mixed ages -
some fresh and juicy and some brown and compacted looking, then I'd
turn it a bit. But also as Jonno says, you could use it very thinly
and a long way from stems. Round shrubs or trees maybe, but be very
cautious if you want to use it in either the veg bed or in the flower
bed - maybe you could use it on corn as it's such ag ross feeder.

hm! well there's an idea, i can put it on the corn when it's a bit older. i
haven't got "sheets" - perhaps i'm a bit of a clean freak but i rake out
their house into their yard fairly often (& haven't had them all that long
anyway) - & then it seems to get scratched about so much it couldn't settle
anyway. still, the older bits have shrunk to little dark balls. the whole
lot being a chook-yard clean up, there's fresh there as well.

i'm a little dismayed at the hens' complete disregard for hygiene tbh. the
way they poo in their nests is just outrageous :-) and the way they poo near
the gate where i walk in - it's a bit of a minefield. ha!

I also get horse poop of mixed ages from a neigbour and I use it
straight away. Not too close to stems and on well watered soil and I
always top it with mulch. I swear by horse poop and think it is THE
best manure of all time

that's encouraging!

(although I have a freidn who says rabiit poop
is better). I also find that I have surprisingly few weeds from the
horse poop - possibly because of the mulch as seeds need light to
germinate. I might get 3 oat plants and a few others each year in a
bed of 70 roses which is heavily muclhed and always gets horse poop.
I'd get more wind blown seeds than I get from the horse poop.

i found with my first lot, the same thing. the beds which had weeds were the
ones where i dug it all in & the weed seed would have been in the dirt. the
beds where i spread it, no weeds at all. it's excellent. i'm very impressed
so far.
thanks for your help.
kylie