The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Pigs => Topic started by: SilverFox on June 25, 2014, 06:53:22 pm
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Great news, our very first pigs are arriving this weekend! Taking advantage of the advice and research available, we decided on 3 castrated male weaners from a/the Kune Kune breeder: 'fmsnutter' (a member of this forum) A visit by the Council Animal Health & Welfare Inspector was extremely positive and gave us a thumbs up. Everything is in place in readiness for their arrival but for one thing: 'can we recycle pig manure via the compost for our vegetable garden'?
There are lots of opinions on this so any comments regarding actual experience would be gratefully received....
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The short answer is yes you can use pig muck in your veg garden.
This is what we do, we gather all the muck and dirty straw bedding in a heap and let it rot over at least six month before spreading on the veg garden. Pig muck is quite acidic and can burn if put on neat! So for you gather it all in heap over the summer whilst you have the pigs and then put it on your veg garden over winter and let the worms and nature do its stuff.
As we have a larger permanant herd we bring our pigs in over winter and all the winter muck, bedding etc goes in one heap, at the start of summer this heap is turned over with the JCB and set to one side, then we bring the previous years heap down which is now a crumbly lovlinness and we spread some in the poly tunnel some on the veg garden and the rest is used to grow pumpkins on, when the pumpkins have finished it goes on remains of the heap go on the veg garden to rot down over winter and the cycle begins again.
HTH
mandy :pig:
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Hi, I just found this lovely site and will have quite a few questions. I have resorts in Cebu Island Philippines and have just finished building a large native house for family that lost all in typhoon Haiyan last November. Family decided to go back and rebuild so I decided to make a type of eco farm/resort rental business. I have built a small piggery as 'Lechon' spit roasted young pig is so popular with all my guests.
Anyway manure question....Because pig smells would upset guests I have built a large holding tank with soakaway under the piggery and we wash waste away down a pipe 3 or 4 times a day. This tank will take years to fill and was wondering if that manure which can be dug out later would be good manure for grass, plants vef etc after rotting down in 355 heat+ over a year or so...
Thanks
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Pig muck is high in copper, so don't put it on ground if you have sheep breeds that are particularly susceptible to copper poisoning.
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Tropical Pigs, make sure there is no dangerous build up of methane! Some piggeries I saw on a documentary from the states had explosive fires as a result of the pig muck stored under them.
Helen
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Thanks for that advice Helen. I will make sure of a bit more ventilation under and make sure things that catch fire are moved away...I am thinking if I shovel out a few bucket loads at a time and mix with my main compost heap should also work well...
Mark
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why did you get an inspection? was it a surprise visit? im in aberdeenshire too so just curious.
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Hi there, sorry for not responding haven't logged in for a while. The inspection/visit followed a phone call I made to them regarding information and advice. Though short, it was extremely beneficial and rewarding. Two government publications arrived in the post shortly after which provides useful information on our legal duties regarding pigs. We were also advised that a more formal visit/inspection would occur at a later date but you would be advised in advance by mail. The important thing for us following that meeting was that we had taken the time to ask questions of people in the know and undertaken on-line research. We sleep better at night knowing we are moving in the right direction......