Building a muck heap

After all that philosophising about hope, I thought I should bring myself back to earth with a hefty dollop of muck shoveling.

One of the byproducts of keeping animals is that you end up with very large amounts of manure, which can be a major source of pollution if not handled correctly.

But that need not be the case as correctly used manure can restore fertility to the soil, improve soil quality and reduce dependency on synthetic fertilisers.

The industrial farming solution is the slurry pit with its dangers of environmental pollution, hazards to workers and children, and correct disposal or use.

For the smallholder, however, there is a more traditional approach - the muck heap.

I’m not talking about a pit or midden into which all manner of rubbish and muck is thrown - these are a serious health and pollution hazard, attract rats and flies, and are guaranteed to stink almost all year round.

Instead, I’m talking about a muck heap that is as carefully controlled and nurtured as the most fastidious gardener’s compost heap.

The first decisions to be made are on size and location.

Size is dependent on the type of livestock you keep, how many you have, how many are kept indoors and for how long.

We can have up to six adult pigs, up to 20 piglets or weaners, plus 30 to 50 chickens.

The pigs each spend about six weeks inside a year for farrowing, illness, quarantine or final fattening before slaughter.

While the chickens range about during the day, they seem to save most of their manure for the shed at night - if the weekly removal is anything to go by!

Altogether that amounts to between four and five cubic metres of muck a year.

If we had even a small 20-30hp tractor with muck forks, then I’d go for at least a four-metre by four-metre muck heap, with concrete block walls and a wooden internal division.

That would give me enough space to manoeuvre the tractor and have one muck pile rotting down, while the other was being built up.

But as I don’t have a tractor, I’ve opted for a larger version of the compost box.

We have five one-metre by one-metre by one-metre wooden boxes, in a single line. They are made from pressure-treated wood and painted internally with bitumen paint.

At any given time, one box is empty, one box is being filled and three boxes are rotting down.

I begin with an empty box and cover the bottom with a layer of bare twigs and small branches - usually from our sitka spruce toppings and thinnings. This layer is about 30cm deep and allows air to circulate under the bottom of the heap.

Muck, manure mixed with straw, is then added to the heap but it is vital to thoroughly mix the muck first.

If you don’t mix the muck, you end with solid lumps of manure and large clumps of dry straw.

The easiest way to mix the muck is before it’s remove from the animal housing. Spread it out with a muck fork, use the dry straw to mop up urine (leaving it lie in the urine for 20 minutes or so makes it easier to get all the urine out), and then turn it all over a few times.

If you have a wood-burning range or stove, you can also tip the ashes over the muck and stir them in. The alkali in the ash helps stop the muck from going sour, while the ash will soak up even more urine from the floor.

It does make a rather gloopy mess, but it’s worth the effort. (A sprinkling of lime can be used instead of wood ash.)

Once the muck is about half a metre deep, add a thin layer of good, worm-rich soil. This accelerates decomposition of the muck by introducing soil bacteria, while the worms will help break the solid matter up.

I add a thin layer of grass clippings from time to time, but the emphasis is on thin! Thick layers result in a slimy green mat forming.

Do not add anything else to the muck heap - particularly food scraps, vegetable peelings or weeds. It’s a muck heap, not a compost heap.

Food scraps and peelings attract rats, while weeds inevitably survive and then thrive when the rotted muck is spread on the soil.

The full muck box is then capped with another layer of soil, before being covered with a tarpaulin or black polythene (silage wrap is very useful for this).

Thoroughly weight down the covering with rocks, logs or old tyres (as most farmers do).

Always put more weight on than you think you’ll need and make sure there are no places around the edges where the wind can lift the cover.

In warmer parts of the UK and in hot climates, the muck heap can be left for about four months.

In North-east Scotland, where our croft is located, I’ve found the colder weather means it takes nine to 12 months for the heap to rot down.

A bigger heap that retained heat better would be faster than our smaller heaps, but would still take longer than a muck heap in a location with a warmer climate.

When one muck box is full, I start filling the next one while breaking open the oldest and applying it to the soil. The muck heap next to the emptied one is then turned into that, then the next one into that and so on.