Chickens are the first thing to consider when we decided to have our own a homestead even for a beginner. Not only chickens, even the manure is useful for composting. Regular composting involves variety of organic materials in a compost bin, enclosure or even just in large heap. This process is called “Cold Composting” which is a very slow process and typically takes 6 to 12 months which sped up by turning the compost moving around the material at the bottom of the heap to top of vice versa to mix it up and get more oxygen, over there. Still, it’s a long process.
The other easy process is called “hot Composting” where you can produce compost in a very short time. Additionally, it also has benefits of killing weeds and pathogens, and break down the material in to very fine compost.
Hot composting method was developed by University Of California which is often called Berkley method is one of the fast, efficient, high temperature and composting technique which produces high quality compost in 18 days.
Perfect Chicken Manure Compost In Just 18 Days:
Here are some steps to involve for making compost in just 18 days.
• The chicken manure materials should be composted and must be chopped fairly small, probably ½ to 11/2 inches of diameter.
• The carbon and nitrogen ratio should be 30:1. Moisture content of pile must remain around 50% but not soggy, soppy wet and not dry either.
• To create necessary heat for your compost, minimum mass is required. According to Dr. Raabe’s a pile of at least 36x36x36 and if the pile is under 32 it will not work. High temperature favor the micro organisms and are most rapid decomposers, they function at about 160 degrees and it is said that a good pile maintain temperature itself.
• Make sure the pile is not over heated, allow it for aeration. While many resources of Berkeley method composting suggest four days after building the pile then turning it every other day. But, turning it regularly will helps in rapid completion of the composting process.
• Don’t keep adding to it, since added materials will be starting the decomposition process from scratch. You just need to end up as a nice finished product all at one time.
• As long as the nutrient balance is absolutely correct, your pile will begin the decomposition process on its own and no active materials need to be added.
If you’ve done correctly, your pile will reach high temperatures within 48 hours. If you reach the pile two days after building it, then something is off. It might be too wet, too dry or pile doesn’t contain enough amount of nitrogen.
• If you feel it’s too wet, then rake it out to dry, then pull the pile back together. If you feel it’s too dry, then add some water.
• If you have realized you erred on the side of too many brown materials, then adding some grass clippings or manure can balance things.
• Make sure the pile shouldn’t smell bad, it should be earthy. If the pile smells like ammonia it means, it is high in nitrogen content. So, add some sawdust to balance it out C:N ratio.
Now, you know how to compost chicken manure in 18 days, am damn sure, it will definitely be your method for utilizing contents of chicken barn floor next time!