Brooklyn1 wrote:
"Natural Girl" wrote:

How long do you think it should it be
composted before it's safe to use it?

All manure needs to be composted a minimum of one year before used in
a garden.

Not true. I have broken this rule constantly for decades and never damaged
a plant or anything else.


When too fresh it will damage plant roots

Only if it is a "hot" compost like rabbit or bird AND if it is applied too
close and too heavily.

I apply "cool" manure to mature plants while it is still warm out of the
horse. The plant all thrive. This supplies digested organics and some
nutrients at the same time.

so by the time it
composts in the ground and your plant roots heal enough that they
would be able to use its nutrients most will have washed away from
rain/watering.

This is completely illogical. How do reckon the solubles leach out in the
garden soil more than spending a year in a compost heap? Ever noticed that
downhill from your compost heap the grass grows extra lush? That's where
half your soluble nutrients go during that year. And a large amount blows
off into the atmosphere as well.

The best way to use manure is to have it well
composted, turn it into a weak tea, and then apply judiciously about
once every ten days.

Fertilising twenty times during a summer growing season is a complete waste
of time when once or twice will suffice.

First you want to lose most of the solubles composting for a year and now
you want to extract the rest into water and apply that. What do you do
with the solid residue - put it out in the municipal waste? What happened
to idea that compost also supplied organic solids which are just as
valuable as the solubles? Oh so you don't toss out the residue you put it
on the garden too. In that case why bother making the tea in first place
when you could have put it on whole? The solubles then have to bind to your
soil somehow if you don't want them leached out, why extract them in the
first place? You would slow the release and save much waste if you quit
this whole rigmarole. You have quite missed the point about compost tea.

This possible takes the record for the most confused, labour intensive and
wasteful system of manure use I have ever heard of.

Applying fresh manure directly to soil does more
harm than good.

Only if you are clumsy and heavy handed.


David