The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Smallholding => Land Management => Topic started by: smudger on July 13, 2013, 10:04:55 am
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For a number of good reasons, applying muck to fields is accepted as good / best practice - it deals with a 'waste' issue, it provides nutrients (N, but especially P&K), organic matter and is less acidifying than art/ferts (which are also very expensive).
However.......
I'm struggling, because we only have a 30hp compact tractor which is not man enough for the cheap old muck spreaders (the ones on ebay that go for £3-500) and any thing new costs a fortune - £1500-2500 plus VAT (with tiny, tiny capacity). I've done a fag packet calculation and reckon I could generate c 40 tonnes pa with my sheep and horses over winter. I read to produce max limit 250kg N / ha you need to apply 42t/ ha (that's 6kg N / tonne). I'm in a NVZ so 170kg is my max, plus I only needed 120kg ave this year, so you could say at 20t/ha I could apply muck to 2ha which leaves 5ha with nothing or applying at a much lower rate / topping up with art fertiliser again.
I'm struggling to justify buying an expensive piece of equipment which in effect will only do half a job (unless I buy in composted green waste, but then I already have a spinner and artfert would be easy to apply....). A contractor is out - all their gear is too heavy for our land unless its bone dry and we don't have a loader so they would need to supply two tractors - more expense. Has anyone solved this conundrum on a small scale? What are the old rear discharge (land driven/pto) spreaders like? Not that these are always desperately cheap either, plus there are the spare parts issue if they break.
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To my logic you only have one sane option.. store the muck until you have enough to do the whole field and then go get a contractor in..pick your year for best solid ground. You'll only be paying out for that every 3 years or so. Meanwhile if you need fertiliser then buy in.
The mad option is that life often comes down to one man and a shovel. I had a good 10+tons of rotted horse dung dumped on one of my 1/4 acre veggie patches last year: this geriatric, a shovel and a wheelbarrow spread that - not a job i wish to repeat too soon. Compared with nice Mr Farmer down the road sending his contractor down to muck spread my second patch this year.. took about 15 seconds and one pass with that monstrosity of a machine they had!
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When I farmed commercially back in the 70's on my dad's farm (400 acres+) we didn't have a muck spreader.
Loaded it onto a tipping trailer. Drove up and down field with the trailer raised whilst someone walked behind with a muck rake and pulled it off into small piles every few metres. We then walked up and down with a fork spreading by hand.
So it can be done manually if you are so inclined!
If you have never seen one a muck rake looks like this.
(http://www.antiquefarmtools.info/USERIMAGES/018(1).jpg)
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To my logic you only have one sane option.. store the muck until you have enough to do the whole field and then go get a contractor in..pick your year for best solid ground. You'll only be paying out for that every 3 years or so. Meanwhile if you need fertiliser then buy in.
The mad option is that life often comes down to one man and a shovel. I had a good 10+tons of rotted horse dung dumped on one of my 1/4 acre veggie patches last year: this geriatric, a shovel and a wheelbarrow spread that - not a job i wish to repeat too soon. Compared with nice Mr Farmer down the road sending his contractor down to muck spread my second patch this year.. took about 15 seconds and one pass with that monstrosity of a machine they had!
Problem is I am in a NVZ and must move my muck heap every 12 mths, so without a huge amount of effort, its a yearly job. I think a cheap ground driven muckspreader (if I can find one) may be the only answer to the low HP tractor.
As for the muck rake / manual labour route - I should point out I have already 'manhandled' twice the weight ie 80 tonnes already - based on moi and seul moi, mucking out the stables and sheds and mostly moi collecting, offloading, storing and taking to sheds/ stables the feed, hay and bedding! I should really be several stones lighter, shouldn't I after all that work?
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2 thoughts:-
1. Any other smallholders or vintage enthusiasts in your area that would come and do the job ?
2. How big is your compact ? Does it have ground drive pto ? Buy your ebay muck spreader, but only half fill it ?
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You made the point before that a contractor would need a loader to load any spreader so presumably you don't have one and even with an alternate old style spreader still need to shovel it full or shovel the heap elsewhere.
All that is the backbreaking part of the job..dumping small piles on the filed has to be easy in comparison then perhaps some sort of simple towable rake and chain to spread the piles out if you don;t want to do that bit by hand?
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We do have a small digger :thumbsup: to load the muck spreader ourselves (easier on a flat bed type spreader). I am much more comfortable spreading rotted manure than fresh from a worm perspective plus the manure is majorily 'produced' when there is spreading restrictions through the winter. NVZ / SFP cross compliance means willy nilly dropping piles of manure isn't on. Large field heaps with minimum footprint required.
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cross compliance means willy nilly dropping piles of manure isn't on
'carefully calculated quantum manure alliquots scentifically placed for subsequent redistribution' :eyelashes:
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I spread mine with an old dumper driving round while slowly raising the bucket. Then ran over the field with a chain harrow. :thumbsup:
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would it be cost effective to get an old 'full size' tractor to tow the muck spreader?
They tend to be a lot cheaper than compact tractors, and certainly cheaper than buying a 'compact' muckspreader
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Finite resources, but yes would love a bigger tractor but can't afford it. Might try the dumper for this winter and see how it gets on as we do have a rather swish tied harrow which under utilised. But in meantime if anyone is selling a land driven muckspreader (good condition) get in touch...
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I have a 1000 litre tank up on pallets under the downpipe, I through the poo in the top tank then I have a second tank down below that collects the watered down poop, pump into 250 litre tank then off to spread.
Free fertilizer and easy application.
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Hi :wave:
Neat
SV