Questions tagged [manure]

Manure is organic material that is used as a fertilizer. Manure can be from animals, plants ("green manure"), or compost.

Most often when people say "manure" they mean animal feces, possibly mixed with bedding -- straw, hay, or wood shavings - from where the animal is housed. Different animals produce manures with different nutrient contents, but most are a good source of nitrogen.

"Green manure" is plant material used specifically for soil improvement. Certain crops, such as legumes (clover, beans, etc.) can fix nitrogen from the air, so planting these adds nitrogen to the soil. Other crops, such as winter rye, will scavenge nitrogen left over from a previous crop; this protects this critical nutrient from being lost through leaching. When the green manure crops are tilled in, the nutrients contained in the green manure benefit the following crop.

is simply decomposed organic material -- including both of the above.

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What is the functional difference between cow manure and sheep manure?

I know that they come from different sources, but is there a reason to prefer one over the other? Are they appropriate for different tasks?
Chris Cudmore
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how different manures perform in a garden

I was just thinking, how do different manures from animals perform in a garden? Since each animal has different digestive systems and different meals I would think the manure is very different, say comparing a chicken to a cow. So the question, how…
Ljk2000
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What's the best way to utilise chicken manure?

We have a few chickens. They produce a small but steady supply of manure. As I understand it chicken manure is an excellent fertiliser. What's the optimum way to utilise it in the garden? Is it best to add the chicken manure to our general compost…
Tea Drinker
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advice after applying pigeon manure

I have created 4 new raised beds in my allotment today and filled them with soil, my aim is to transplant established (4 years old) rhubarb plants into one from the pots they are in and use the other 3 for strawberries which again have been…
Richard C
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