Aeromaster Education Blog

When dairy farmer Mark Webb, owner of an 1,800 cow dairy in Idaho, switched from a confined facility to open corrals, he found himself faced with a manure problem, namely far too much of it.

Webb's strategy to deal with his dairy waste, which consists of both manure and spent bedding, was to haul it onto portions of his 4,000 acres of cropland. After several years of these heavy manure applications, Mark noticed this practice was having a negative impact on the health of his crops, and soil. And the manure was still “piling up,” literally. Webb needed another solution to deal with his manure problem. He thought composting with a mechanical tractor-pulled compost turner might be the answer.

With rising feed and fertilizer costs and a fluctuating commodities market, 2012-2013 is shaping up to be a hard year for dairy farmers. Droughts in the Midwest have drastically increased feed prices, and forced some farmers to switch feeds, from corn to wheat. Fertilizer prices continue their upward price trend, making it difficult for dairies growing their own feed to be profitable. Yet two dairy farms in Idaho have found a way to reduce costs and become independent from buying fertilizers, by producing their own on the farm. And they're doing it through composting.

If the bristles on your toothbrush are worn and bent, how successfully will they create clean, white teeth? If the tines on your compost turner are worn and bent, how successfully will they remove the bad stuff in a compost windrow, namely CO₂. Since we all know a good toothbrush promotes good oral health, similarly, good turner tines, promote good, high quality compost.

Tines get the bad stuff out!

It’s critical for the health of the windrow that you practice good CO₂ management, replacing the carbon dioxide that builds up there with oxygen. This is accomplished by the design, placement, and durability of the tines mounted on the turner drum. CO₂ is a waste product of those billions of little microbial critters in the pile breaking down organic matter. The gaseous exchange which takes place during a pass of the compost turner should result in 4% or less of CO₂ in the windrow right after it is turned. This can be measured with a CO₂ kit. 

Remember when gasoline used to be below $2.00 a gallon? (Some of us can remember $0.30 a gallon, but we aren’t telling). Today, it costs twice as much to fill your tank. The sad truth is, if you don’t want to sit by the side of the road, you have to find the extra money somewhere and that means you have less money for other purchases.

The cost of fertilizer is going in the same direction. Chances are, of course, that you have already experienced that “in the belly” worry about how much more money fertilizer costs. You are dependent on fertilizer and you have no control over the price. Like the gasoline you need to run your cars and trucks, you probably think you don’t have any choices.

 

I talk to farmers all of the time about the condition of their soil. There’s certainly no such thing as “perfect soil”. A lot of the farmers I talk to have specific problems with their soil… but no solutions.

As farmers, we all work with the soil we have. I bet you would love to have some surefire solutions to the problems you have in your soil because, of course, better soil means better crops. That means more profit and more money to your bottom line. Finding ways to increase the quality of your soil can be a real challenge.

 

How would you like to find a new way to make money? Imagine using something you are already doing to create more profits, and how about being able to help others at the same time?

Where we live, a lot of people are pretty enthusiastic about how much better organically grown produce tastes. Organic farming is a hot topic. There are a lot more sustainable farmer’s markets popping up.  Let’s face it; Whole Foods certainly isn’t hurting for sales even while charging much higher prices than the local supermarket.

$1,500,000 is a lot of money. It is a sum that really catches your attention. You can dream a little (well, a lot) when you think of having an extra 1.5 million dollars in your pocket.

Let me tell you about a farmer in Walnut, Illinois who improved his bottom line by over $100 per acre by using an Aeromaster Compost Turner. We started working with Alan Dale in 2002. He began to test the effect of using Humus compost on 1000 acres of his 2200 acre farm. Each year, he planted a number of different crops.

 

We heard from a farmer recently who had increased his total bushels by 60 per acre. Now that’s exciting. Another farmer shared with us that he was able to reduce his labor costs for watering by 50%. You can bet that put a lot more money into his pocket.

Sometimes, that old saying, “don’t fix it if it isn’t broken” is oh so true. Humus compost was used for centuries until around World War II when chemical fertilizers became more popular. Seen as the “new and better” solution, these fertilizers gained popularity until pretty recently.

 

Have you ever heard the expression `can’t see the forest for the trees`? Sometimes, the biggest secrets are right under our nose. Like making a profit from humus technology, for example.

Biological farming to create humus in soil that leads to produce of a greater nutritional density has been around forever. In fact, it’s the basis of civilization.

You’ve probably heard that old expression ‘build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door.’ Well, as fertilizer prices continue to escalate, many savvy farmers are demonstrating that old saying applies more than ever in today’s new economy.

Not are they only beating a path to new soil fertilization alternatives, they’re throwing aside age old practices in their efforts to boost profits and create a safer environment at the same time.