Compost Building

[Ed Thayer]

I am pleased the local zoning board of adjustment just approved a setback requirement for my proposed compost shed.

I will be building a 12 foot deep by 20 foot long shed to compost our horse manure. We plan to top dress our pasture and fields with the ground driven manure spreader we purchased a while ago.

The shed will be divided into two 10 x 12 bins, one for active compost and one for storage. The front wall will be 10 feet high as to permit turning with a tractor if needed. The bins will have 4′ walls for storage. It will also be covered with a tin roof.

I hope to eliminate the need for commercial fertilizer on my fields and save some money.

Chime in please if you have any constructive criticism or suggestions.

Ed

[Robin]

If you are a farm, why does the planning board have any say at all?
We have an open manure pile for four steers, so far no problem from the town.
Why are you covering it??? Just curious.
Thanks.

[Rod]

I don’t have a comment but can tell you what I do with my cow manure. Since it’s mixed in with hay waste from the feeders I have to compose most of it so it will not clog up the beaters on the spreader.

My pit is 36′ by 36′ with 3′ high waste concrete block walls and a concrete floor. It’s connected to my two dry lot areas and loafing barns where my cow spend most of the winter. All the yards and buildings have concrete floors. The cows also have free access to two sacrifice paddocks with mounds for walking around and goofing off. My winter waste just about fills the pit up to a height of 3 to 4′

On winter days when the manure is not frozen I push it into the pit with a skid steer and pile it up in sections. The stuff with waste hay in one area and the cleaner stuff in another. In the spring the clean manure gets spread on the fields and garden. The rest get re-piled and turned every couple of weeks through the summer until the hay is broken down and then I spread it which is usually in the fall. I sometimes drag it after spreading using my horses and a chain drag. This breaks up the bigger clumps and scratches the ground up bit.

Before I put the concrete down I had a terrible mess in the spring with muck up to the cows stomachs and stones in my manure which ended up in the fields and occasionally were flung at me on the tractor. No cover on the pit but I don’t get a lot of runoff from it either. The whole system works great and I like it a lot.

I don’t use any commercial fertilizer and vary my manure applications based on the field’s needs and uses. Since I buy most of my hay (about 150 round bales a year) and graze all my open land I am importing fertility on to the farm each year. We have abundant clover, too much in fact for the cows and I have to keep an eye on them in some areas because of the potential for bloat. The bees love it however and we routinely make 100 plus lbs. of honey per hive each year on the white clover. Cows, managed pastures and honey bees have a three way symbiotic relationship.

[Ed Thayer]

I want to set the compost shed 10 feet from the town right of way. Our town set back is 50 feet, so I needed a VARIANCE. This is what would work best on our farm.

I thought the roof would allow for controlled moisture during the composting process. I read it was important? And should I not have horses in the future, it is a great storage building.

The concrete floor will reduce the contamination from the dirt surrounding the bins, giving me a cleaner end product, no stones, or dirt.

[Carl Russell]

Ed, sounds about right. My dream plan includes pigs in part of the upper structure to turn the compost, and a green house as well to take advantage of the CO2 and nitrogen rich warm air.

Carl

[Joshua Kingsley]

How did you decide on the bin dimensions? I would like to have a rough idea on the storage area that would be needed for my animals in the future. The roof is a good idea, my one hesitation may be the need to add water in the future for composting? I guess the moisture would dependant on the material? Any info would be appreciated thaks josh

[Ed Thayer]

@Joshua Kingsley 10207 wrote:

How did you decide on the bin dimensions? I would like to have a rough idea on the storage area that would be needed for my animals in the future. The roof is a good idea, my one hesitation may be the need to add water in the future for composting? I guess the moisture would dependant on the material? Any info would be appreciated thaks josh

Josh,

I used information provided to me by Dick Uncles from the NH Department of Agriculture. He made an informal visit to our farm and made several reccomendations regarding manure management, pasture rotation and water quality mitigation ideas.

My bin sizes will be 10 x 12 and were calculated using the manure management spreadsheet provided by Dick.

Attached is a link to a web site that covers a lot of material and is very good in my opinion.

Carl,

I visited Jen’s farm this spring and she had piglets in the compst pile. They were doing a great job of turning the compost and looked very happy in there.

[bivol]

how about keeping chickens on the compost heap? they would eat a lot of flies, give some of their fertilizer too, and you’d feed them for less.
or muscovy ducks, too. AND, both taste good!

highway has a point! join the piglets and chickens, and you get more even spread of chicken fertilizer, and they eat more flies!

only, use small pigs, and grown-up, fast chickens, no chicks!

and, DON’T use muscovy ducks together with pigs! the pigs could learn to eat the ducks, they’re too slow for pigs.

[jen judkins]

Ed, as you mentioned, you have seen my compost shed. Its 3 bins…all 10 x10 with removable walls on 3 sides. The back side and floor are cement. The walls are 4 feet (the cement wall is alittle higher). It has a roof, but is open otherwise. Moisture has not been an issue and I have not had to add water to my compost.

In early spring, when it was still pretty cold out at night, I put the new piglets in one bin, while I finished filling the other two. In two weeks they had turned that pile over to my satisfaction. That pile went on my potato patch. Then I moved them to the other two bins, so they had twice as much room. They had both bins composted within the month and then they went to the goat pen, where they are now. Over all, I couldn’t be happier with that arrangement and will do it again next year.

The only change I would make (and still might) is to make to walls abit taller.

[Ed Thayer]

A little update on the compost shed.

We have the slab down and I erected the posts for the structure. I cut the rafters yesterday and will install them this morning.

Hope to get that done before it reaches 90 today.

All the hemlock for this project was from my neighbors property who also has a band mill. So he sawed it for me as well.

We like to keep the work local and our money in town.

Ed

[jen judkins]

Nice Ed….pictures please!

[Ed Thayer]

Here are some Pics.

Hope to get the metal roof on by Friday and the bin walls completed this weekend.

Ed

[jen judkins]

Looks very much like mine…always a good sign that I haven’t seriously f%^&d up!:p

[Ed Thayer]

The finished product. Here are some pics,

Ed

[jen judkins]

Very nice, Ed! Now go work on that spreader…I want pictures before October!!!!

[Author]

Posts