OT Gardening Question - What age cow manure for fertilizer?

Have a question about spreading cow manure on the garden, should we use fresh or aged, and aged is how long? We have hard soil and are looking to help break it down, put some sand in it a few years back but that did not seem to help much. Still get hard as a rock and hard to till. Neighbor buddy kids just joined 4h and are raising steer so I a good close supply, but it may be only a few months old. Should I use it or wait till the end of the year and disc it in before winter? Need some advice here.

Few months old should be fine. Cow manure is not high enough in nitrogen to cause problems, unlike that from chickens which has to be used cautiously. Over a years time it will lose some of its fertilizer value.

KEH

If you have a compost pile, add about a 1/3 of the piles amount in cow manure to make a good additive to the soil. When spread over the garden, It gives a great boost to transplants.

if the soil is heavy--like clay== put a couple of inches of sand over it- in the fall spread ur manure disc or till it in and plant rye-- in the spring turn that under-- there is no overnite fix-- it comes with time--

If you can find compost you should add that to your garden. Our county landfill makes compost from leaves and grass clippings. I put about 1.5 tons on last fall. A pickup load cost's about $10.00 and they load it. Plant a over crop in the Fall and plow it under in the Spring. Buckwheat is good for smothering weeds if you can find it your area. I used steer manure when I could get it and you wouldn't believe the worms when that was plowed under. The smell wasn't too sweet either and my former neighbor wanted to know what that smell was. You probably need to check your garden's soil ph level. If it's low you can add lime. If it won't grow red beets it's a good indication that you need lime. Hal

That's a cover crop. Hal

You might want to look into what the animal's been fed.

Last summer there were a lot of problems with Dow's aminopyralid, in their Forefront. A broad-leaf herbicide that they don't exaggerate about being long-lived. It survived the trip from the field, through the animal, and was still active when spread on veggie gardens.

Not approved for vegetables, it caused deformed vegetables in thousands of gardens. Dow says "As a general rule, we suggest damaged produce (however this is caused) should not be consumed." Those who have already used
contaminated manure are advised not to replant on the affected soil for at least a year.

I use a lot of manure, the horse owner usually has no idea what might have been sprayed on the hay. Horses are also routinely de-wormed here, but that doesn't survive more than a few months in the manure. Fresh manure would kill my garden worms.

My solution is to compost all manure if I don't know exactly what it is. I prefer low-temperature composting, which means the manure is a year old before it gets into my garden with excellent soil from years of adding compost.

If you know what the steer's been fed, you're in good shape either way. The longer you wait to use the manure, the lower the nitrogen. So I use lots of manure.

That's interesting what VA Tom wrote about the chemicals, good idea to know what you are really getting.

I used to make a few hundred to 1000 + yards of horse manure compost at our place. When it's fresh, the nitrogen in it, is what breaks down the carbon, like hay and wood shavings, once that is completed by aeration, it's ready for use. If used sooner, it can rob nitrogen from your soils and work against your plants, best to have this full composted or broke down 1st. The composted material is an excellent soil conditioner, you can till it in, use it concentrated in the hole under your plant etc. For gardening, I use this compost, directly under the plant, but I do add dried blood and bone meal for organic fertilizer. I think as a rule of thumb, buy doing this and without analysis of the composted material it's a safe bet to address the nutrient needs of the plants you put in, and it's easy enough to beef up the compost one wheel barrow at a time, and place under the plant in the hole you dig for it. The plants really benefit from the nutrients, it holds moisture well, you can apply more fertilizer and till it in after the plants are in if need be, works great for all the garden vegetables I plant as I have clay/gravel underneath so when I dig the hole, it's hard ground, this compost is great when applied like this, as right now I only have about 6"-8" of topspoil. Eventually I will dig out the entire area and fill in with much better material.

You did not say how deep the sand was applied. I had to go 2 inches over 6 inches of clay loam to really make a difference.
I have not seen mentioned the use of manure versus tuber vegetables (potatoes). If those type of vegetables are to be planted, the manure should be composted for around a year. This should allow things like salmenella to die out if present. I have used fresh manure for things like sweet corn. The previous posters are correct that it is a good idea to know the animal's diet and the general history of care (medications administered) before applying any manure.

Couple months old and clay soil? Suggest you use double dig bed method and put manure on bottom layer as well as stir some in top- this will mean a 4 inch layer of partially aged manure a foot deep, then 6 inchs of losened soil from top dig layer, then another 2 inch layer of manure, then final layer of soil taken from 6 inchs down with some manure/compost mixed together. This will give you some happy worms and loosened soil next year while haveing a relatively enriched and loosened soil this year for deep root crops like corn, tomatoes, peppers that will reach the first from top manure layer by mid season. Weed seeds are buried too deep in bottom layer to be a problem, top layer not much weed activity either. This is sometimes called French intensive/market garden bed. Hugelkulture is German term for similar 'bury rough material deep in clay soils' garden beds or Bavarian beds. RN

Well I would just spread it on anytime during the winter or spring plow it down and do this every year as it will take 30 years for it to really change things unless you add feet of it each year and then you had better add some lime as the acid in the manure will create an acidic condition. PH should be from at least 6.2-7.0 for most plants.
A good soil test should be done for real accuracy to give best results. Organic matter does not guarantee good fertility in the soil. it does however give tilth to the soil, along with moisture holding ability as it binds light soils and loosens heavy soils.

Hi Billy,

I live on a mountain, no topsoil here. Started with subsoil, rich in minerals, no humus. After a few years of adding compost there is a major change in my garden. I haven't tilled for several years, just distribute compost.

Last year 2 Master Gardeners visited. Both were amazed at the vitality of my produce. Both were standing on compost piles, neither realized it.

I layer manure, green (generally weeds), manure, green, ... Then leave it alone. By low temperature composting, I allow my produce to self-seed. There is almost nothing I bother to plant any more, just let things self-seed. I add more subsoil to my compost, figuring that whatever the plants depleted came from that.

Seems to me that you would do better by not replacing your soil, just keep adding to it. What used to be hard here now is teeming with worms and you can jam your hand nearly to your wrist into soil that hasn't been tilled for several years.

Those microbes really will do their job if you feed them (compost) and leave them alone (no tilling). I've got tables that show what you should add to compost, depending on what results you want. I haven't tested my soil, but the veggies are extremely happy, providing me with year 'round harvests. Under glass in winter, as promoted by Eliot Coleman.

Manure is the tricky part. I've located clean donkey manure, no herbicides or other chemicals which I'm hoping will work well. Horse manure here has a lot of chemicals in it that I don't want in my garden. Even antibiotics can be taken up by the plants.

You can put the dry material in a barrel,add water wait till it breaks down, dilute, then pour on the plant roots.