Dried poultry litter as organic fertilizer

Today, I'm here to talk about organic fertilizers, in this case, dried poultry litter, an organic fertilizer we're carrying at Central Valley Ag. Over the past couple of years, we've been bringing in dried chicken litter; then, we sell it, mainly to organic growers, who are looking for a source of nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, or other micronutrients.

So, what does manure bring to the table? Biological activity; by adding carbon to the soil, we're replacing some of what we pulled out with all of our crops. This addition gives the biology something to eat in that off-season as we put fertilizer down in the fall and the spring.

Most of the time, when we are dealing with any type of manure, it's a fairly wet product. It doesn't handle well, and it isn't what we typically work with at the cooperative. However, in this case, the product we've got here is only about five percent moisture; it flows really well, and is even a little dusty. I'd typically wear a dust mask when I'm working with it. The nice thing about it is we can move it through a lot of our spinner applicators and make a nice even application across the field.

Normal rates are anywhere from 500 pounds. Some growers are doing lighter rates just to put some nutrients out there for soybeans. If the manure is the main program for the nitrogen in front of their corn crop, that rate is likely to be more in the one ton or even a ton and a half rate. Hear more examples of rates by watching the video.

If you are interested in growing organic, CVA did our first organic research site by Marquette, Nebraska. We have not harvested the plot yet, but will gather that data soon. One of the products we used in our trials was dried chicken litter. We're excited to see how it performed. Typically, you may think of your cooperative as only selling to the conventional growers, but we at CVA are trying to bring value to all of our different producers out there, including organic growers.

If you are a conventional or organic grower, and you are interested in learning what fertilizer products CVA has to offer, contact your field sales agronomist or me to learn more.