The Bovine Bugle

The beach isn't the only hot spot

Our trip to Popham Beach was great, with wonderful weather and fun stops along the way to and from the beach. We wouldn't have been able to take a couple days off without my parents here to take care of things, and sister Patty helped out too. When my siblings and I were growing up my parents didn't have anyone here to help them, so overnight trips to anywhere just didn't happen.

The beach weather was nice and hot, but there was some hot stuff happening right here on the farm while we were gone. Ben had cleaned out the bedded packs from the two shelters we overwintered animals in, placed the material in a windrow; and turned it with the Sittler windrow turner. The material had plenty of hay bedding in it, and it heated up very fast. This morning when I took the pictures the windrow was steaming, and you can see by the thermometer that the temperature of the material was over 160 degrees in some spots. HOT STUFF! These high temperatures will cause the composting process to proceed at a good clip, and will kill weed seeds and pathogens that may be in the compost material.

The conditions around here are still very dry. We won't have to use the compost covers to keep excess rainfall off the windrows, and turning the windrows will go easily with the good traction along the edge of the windrows.

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