Manure's Fertility Value

Rick Koelsch Author

03/05/2021 Added

144 Plays

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From "Benefits & Barriers to Manure Use" portion of Land Application Training 2021

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[00:00:00.350]We're gonna start off talking a little bit
[00:00:01.960]about the value of manure
[00:00:05.290]and how you try to get the greatest potential value
[00:00:09.050]out of that manure.
[00:00:11.240]I always like to start off with a little story
[00:00:14.570]that I picked up some time ago
[00:00:16.390]and not for certain that it's true
[00:00:18.360]but I heard it from enough places.
[00:00:20.540]I'm gonna assume it's true.
[00:00:23.440]There was a time in the history of Europe actually,
[00:00:28.250]when manure was supposedly valued pretty highly.
[00:00:32.360]In fact, it was moved between countries,
[00:00:36.760]moved between regions by wooden ships
[00:00:40.250]in that 16th, 17th century.
[00:00:44.230]There was only one problem with that exchange
[00:00:47.130]of manure that was going on at that time.
[00:00:49.670]That they encountered.
[00:00:51.220]Is that these wooden ships tended to leak water
[00:00:54.380]on occasions.
[00:00:55.850]And so a leaky ship, water and manure
[00:01:00.510]down in the hold of the ship,
[00:01:03.160]as you might expect that may be a bit of a problem,
[00:01:06.020]wet manure, it produces a gas,
[00:01:09.230]anybody know what kind of a gas that actually produces?
[00:01:15.560]The gas is methane or natural gas.
[00:01:19.830]And so the captain would sometimes send
[00:01:23.580]one of the unknowing sailors
[00:01:25.650]down into the hold of the ship
[00:01:27.080]to check out the ships, see how it's performing.
[00:01:29.520]And they turn on their oil lantern and blow up the ships.
[00:01:34.870]And so the problem they were having with shipping manure
[00:01:38.190]was the tragedy of ships being sunk
[00:01:41.200]as a result of the production of methane.
[00:01:44.180]Well, they decided that the way to prevent this
[00:01:47.854]from happening, was to begin labeling these containers
[00:01:52.170]that had manure in them.
[00:01:53.880]And that the label was Stow High In Transport.
[00:02:01.940]And some would say, that is the origin of a word
[00:02:05.880]that sometimes gets myself,
[00:02:08.260]maybe a few of you in trouble.
[00:02:10.940]So, S - H - I - T.
[00:02:14.270]And so the next time that word slips from your lips.
[00:02:19.940]You might just suggest to that person,
[00:02:22.890]you're having the conversation with that,
[00:02:25.120]you were thinking about the value of manure
[00:02:28.900]and that is a good thing today.
[00:02:31.630]So we'll leave that story where it's at here, okay.
[00:02:37.170]But we wanna try to put some value on these manure.
[00:02:40.830]And then be able to assign this to an individual field.
[00:02:44.420]Because manure is not gonna have the same value
[00:02:47.810]to each field that we may want to consider.
[00:02:51.127]And we're gonna give you some tools
[00:02:53.000]to put that in place today.
[00:02:57.690]We're gonna go through just a two step process.
[00:03:01.830]The first step is to estimate the potential value
[00:03:07.180]of manure nutrients.
[00:03:09.040]And there's the source for that worksheet.
[00:03:12.173]Then the second step we're gonna go through is,
[00:03:15.360]what is the value of that manure to an individual field?
[00:03:20.500]And we're gonna apply this to a situation
[00:03:24.360]where we have a feedlot up here
[00:03:26.240]in the upper left hand corner.
[00:03:29.070]And three fields in which we could apply that
[00:03:33.541]manure to.
[00:03:34.374]And I'm gonna ask you before the evening is out
[00:03:37.090]to make an estimate of what is the value of
[00:03:40.510]going to each of those fields.
[00:03:42.710]and then what is the cost for delivering manure
[00:03:45.910]to each of those fields.
[00:03:47.480]And make a decision based upon what the results are.
[00:03:52.180]Starts with a manure analysis,
[00:03:56.220]we're gonna work from that column.
[00:03:58.630]That is the as is.
[00:04:00.320]The total nutrients as is column.
[00:04:04.890]We'll be working with nitrogen values,
[00:04:07.730]both the organic and the ammonium.
[00:04:10.410]We'll also be using values for four other nutrients,
[00:04:15.540]phosphorus, potassium, sulphur and zinc.
[00:04:19.370]Most cases that greatest value is gonna be
[00:04:22.010]in the nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium.
[00:04:24.700]But we may start that process of seeing
[00:04:28.200]what that value might be for those other two.
[00:04:31.370]So step one is just to find those values
[00:04:34.910]in your manure's sample.
[00:04:37.430]And then we're gonna add those to a worksheet here.
[00:04:42.190]And I'm gonna walk you through this example,
[00:04:47.000]and we've decided to put this manure on a field
[00:04:50.470]that's forecast to be a corn field next spring.
[00:04:55.750]a 220 bushel per acre, yield goal for that field.
[00:05:00.270]And so we're gonna try to determine the potential value.
[00:05:04.920]I'll not walk you through everything in the spreadsheet.
[00:05:07.140]I'm just gonna highlight a few things
[00:05:09.670]that you'll be adding.
[00:05:11.130]The blue cells are the cells that you provide
[00:05:13.640]the numbers to
[00:05:14.473]and then the calculations are done in the other cells.
[00:05:17.990]So the first thing I'll just mention here is
[00:05:21.420]we would want to enter the characteristics
[00:05:24.800]from that manure sample.
[00:05:26.530]And you can see that they're going in that area,
[00:05:28.800]that's just been circled.
[00:05:34.850]Below that we also need to provide the spreadsheet
[00:05:39.320]with some idea of either the nutrient requirement
[00:05:43.780]of that field or the nutrient
[00:05:47.030]removed by that 220 bushel corn crop.
[00:05:52.160]And so just, I estimated the requirement
[00:05:56.130]using Nebraska's algorithm for nitrogen,
[00:06:00.240]and that would suggest for this field
[00:06:02.520]we're gonna need 204 pounds of nitrogen.
[00:06:06.730]And the remaining values for the phosphorus,
[00:06:10.080]potassium, sulfur, and zinc.
[00:06:12.450]These are as removed.
[00:06:15.890]So a for example, a bushel of corn,
[00:06:21.180]we'll remove about 0.35 pounds of phosphate.
[00:06:28.440]So I simply take the 220 times 0.35
[00:06:35.130]and that gives me the 76.
[00:06:37.580]And then I'd have to look up similar values
[00:06:39.870]for potassium sulfur, and zinc.
[00:06:42.340]So that's the content of that nutrient
[00:06:46.310]in the crop and so, 76 pounds of phosphate is removed
[00:06:51.440]from the soil by a 220 bushel corn crop.
[00:06:55.820]Now I'm not gonna meet all of the nitrogen needs
[00:06:59.270]in this crop, I'm only gonna apply 20 tons
[00:07:02.030]to the acre of manure here.
[00:07:04.720]And not gonna walk you through all of these calculations.
[00:07:08.620]The other thing I would need to put in here is,
[00:07:12.300]what's the value of those nutrients.
[00:07:15.310]That I probably could get some help
[00:07:17.190]from a local co-op or from your local extension educator.
[00:07:22.360]And after those values have been put in,
[00:07:26.000]this little calculator will give you,
[00:07:30.320]what I would call the potential value.
[00:07:34.100]Kind of the maximum value.
[00:07:36.330]And that is about $59 for the nitrogen,
[00:07:41.377]$161 for the phosphorus, $53 for the potassium.
[00:07:48.120]So that's the nutrient value.
[00:07:51.320]I also decided for this corn crop,
[00:07:53.870]I think I could get 10 more bushels per acre.
[00:07:57.640]That's something you can decide,
[00:07:58.870]whether you want to put it in your situation.
[00:08:01.610]But I've added 10 bushel per acre at $4.
[00:08:05.200]And there's another $40 value here starting.
[00:08:08.740]My total potential value is $350.
[00:08:14.350]So that's the situation we're working with.
[00:08:17.840]Now what I want you to do next,
[00:08:20.970]is to take this potential value and apply it
[00:08:24.930]to those three fields that we shared in
[00:08:27.978]that aerial image, here just a few minutes ago.
[00:08:32.970]And the three fields that we'll return to
[00:08:36.130]in that aerial image are the Vaughn's site,
[00:08:40.530]the North tillers and the South tillers.
[00:08:46.080]And to the left hand area here,
[00:08:50.090]I've taken part of a soil sample
[00:08:53.830]that we're gonna for determining value.
[00:08:57.840]And we're gonna use that now.
[00:09:01.240]On the right hand side I'm gonna do a quick hand calculation
[00:09:06.180]as to of that potential value of the manure.
[00:09:09.900]What is the value for that field?
[00:09:13.310]So let's just start with nitrogen here.
[00:09:18.216]We're gonna grow corn on each of those three fields.
[00:09:21.970]The manure has a value of $60 or $59 per acre.
[00:09:28.960]And we saw up above would you include the value
[00:09:32.960]of that manure nitrogen for any, or all of those fields?
[00:09:39.270]What would you do?
[00:09:41.670]We're gonna need nitrogen for all three of those fields.
[00:09:44.310]So I can put up $59 value under each of those fields.
[00:09:52.250]Okay?
[00:09:54.380]Next we need to decide on a value for the phosphorus.
[00:10:01.070]And you'll notice that's this column here.
[00:10:06.470]And there are soil P levels for each of those fields.
[00:10:11.167]And I'm gonna go to a graphic down
[00:10:13.500]in the lower left hand corner of that page.
[00:10:17.500]And it shares in that graphic,
[00:10:21.460]what is the fertilizer recommendation
[00:10:27.000]based upon the soil test level,
[00:10:29.290]which is on the horizontal axis?
[00:10:33.010]So as that soil test increases, there becomes a point
[00:10:37.930]where we start recommending less and less phosphorous.
[00:10:42.400]Now, as long as we are recommending phosphorous,
[00:10:45.820]I would suggest that there is an immediate value
[00:10:49.350]to that manure.
[00:10:50.850]And so I would probably go ahead and give it
[00:10:53.590]whatever we assigned up above to the value of phosphorus.
[00:10:56.890]If we were less than that,
[00:10:58.420]or somewhere 20 to 25 parts per million.
[00:11:02.730]Now once I get beyond 25 part per million,
[00:11:06.810]well I probably won't get any value this year
[00:11:11.210]but I'm gonna be using up phosphorus every year.
[00:11:14.940]And so within the next two, three, four years,
[00:11:18.420]I should be getting much of that value out of that manure P.
[00:11:23.220]And as we get to higher and higher soil phosphorous levels,
[00:11:27.810]it becomes increasingly questionable,
[00:11:32.290]whether I'm gonna get any value, out of that manure.
[00:11:36.080]And it's, there's not really a hard line
[00:11:38.080]where I'd say there's no value at all.
[00:11:40.660]So for that soil P value,
[00:11:46.120]let's start with just the Vaughn's site.
[00:11:50.410]Are we gonna give any value to the phosphorous
[00:11:53.880]at the Vaughn's site?
[00:11:57.800]So I'm comparing 69 and 47 against that.
[00:12:03.180]We're all way off the scale for the break P levels,
[00:12:05.920]that we're out here somewhere.
[00:12:08.830]Should I give any value?
[00:12:11.620]Becky says no, thank you Becky.
[00:12:13.500]I think that's what I will do.
[00:12:16.130]How about for the North tiller's site.
[00:12:23.880]Looks like I'm in somewhere around 20, 25.
[00:12:28.180]I'm right in this area range.
[00:12:32.270]I probably give some values
[00:12:34.040]to the North tiller's site, right?
[00:12:38.240]And if I remember right, what was it, 160, 161?
[00:12:47.090]And looks like I can get immediate value
[00:12:52.240]for the South tiller's site.
[00:12:53.800]So I'll go ahead and give that 161 as well.
[00:12:58.400]And why don't you follow that same process,
[00:13:02.840]and do a quick guess, whether you're gonna get value
[00:13:05.370]to the potassium on these three fields?
[00:13:09.880]So potassium is this column right here.
[00:13:16.490]What fields would you like to give value to for potassium?
[00:13:26.770]Well, if I look at the Vaughn's site,
[00:13:31.160]and I would compare it to that middle table
[00:13:33.300]for potassium here.
[00:13:36.360]Potassium, that break point is somewhere
[00:13:39.900]around 125 part per million.
[00:13:43.730]So Vaughn is well above it, so
[00:13:47.080]probably not gonna give any value to the Vaughn's site.
[00:13:51.500]Same for the tillers, it looks pretty high.
[00:13:54.280]It's down this range.
[00:13:57.530]So I'm not gonna give any value here.
[00:14:03.888]The South tiller's site is very close to that,
[00:14:09.650]That threshold between providing or recommending more
[00:14:13.810]potassium are not recommending.
[00:14:16.460]So I would probably say it's gonna have some value
[00:14:19.510]maybe a little bit this year.
[00:14:21.360]Should be over the next few years,
[00:14:22.940]get some value out of that.
[00:14:24.280]So let's go ahead and give some value here to that site.
[00:14:30.520]And we could do the same over here for sulphur.
[00:14:33.300]I'm not gonna take time and zinc.
[00:14:36.470]And decide if there's numbers you want to fill in there.
[00:14:40.370]But you can see the value is fairly different
[00:14:44.310]between these three fields.
[00:14:46.530]Well, I'm gonna take these numbers
[00:14:48.150]and I'm gonna return to our PowerPoint.
[00:14:52.870]And we'll plug in those numbers for that Vaughn's site.
[00:14:58.210]We only gave value to the nitrogen.
[00:15:00.720]And I also did give value to the increase in yield,
[00:15:04.420]that 10 bushel yield increase.
[00:15:07.260]So the Vaughn's site has a $99 value.
[00:15:12.360]North tiller's is about two and a half times greater.
[00:15:17.830]South tiller's is about three times great.
[00:15:21.970]So a fairly significant difference
[00:15:25.850]between those three sites.
[00:15:28.820]And as you might expect that Vaughn's site
[00:15:31.140]closer to the feedlot, it's probably
[00:15:33.570]received manure a little more frequently.
[00:15:36.310]And there's just at this point in time
[00:15:39.130]with the levels of phosphorus and potassium in that field.
[00:15:42.520]There's just not a whole lot of potential value
[00:15:45.920]to manure to that field, but significantly greater,
[00:15:49.570]if we would be willing to travel another mile
[00:15:52.580]to two miles to get to those two other sites.
[00:15:56.570]So I encourage you to push a pencil,
[00:16:01.020]on individual fields that you consider applying manure to.
[00:16:05.610]And ask, are they similar or are there some differences
[00:16:09.780]that we would want to consider?
[00:16:12.290]We're gonna wrap up this discussion
[00:16:14.080]of the nutrient value of manure.
[00:16:17.030]I've taken just three manure samples,
[00:16:21.020]kind of typical for beef feedlot manure swine,
[00:16:25.190]barn finisher, manure from a deep pit
[00:16:28.920]and then broiler litter.
[00:16:31.260]Is just kind of represented with some of the different
[00:16:34.380]systems we have here in Nebraska.
[00:16:36.580]And just trying to display potential value
[00:16:41.110]in these pie charts.
[00:16:43.560]And you'll see, in all of these fields
[00:16:46.950]phosphorus is a pretty significant part of the value
[00:16:50.750]in almost all manures phosphorus,
[00:16:54.410]In many manures phosphorous is the largest value.
[00:17:00.060]In the case of beef manure,
[00:17:02.980]I guess it's potassium is actually a slight bit smaller.
[00:17:06.290]I must have used a different manure sample
[00:17:08.340]for this example than we were using previously.
[00:17:11.910]So of course this is all dependent upon your manure samples.
[00:17:15.180]So phosphorus, potassium from the feedlot perspective,
[00:17:18.810]from that broiler litter.
[00:17:20.650]Again phosphorus potassium from that swine manure,
[00:17:24.780]I noticed that the nitrogen value here
[00:17:28.830]is fairly significant.
[00:17:31.100]And for that swine manure, I might actually want to be
[00:17:33.720]looking for fields that are in need of nitrogen
[00:17:36.330]as being my first choice and then a field
[00:17:39.610]that requires a phosphorus.
[00:17:43.060]So which fields provide the greatest value?
[00:17:48.380]In most cases, I think we'll want to target fields,
[00:17:53.700]If we're trying to get the peak value
[00:17:55.550]out of that potential value.
[00:17:57.480]We'll target fields that need phosphorous.
[00:18:00.520]Certainly fields that are less than
[00:18:03.410]30 part per million Bray,
[00:18:05.640]would be where I'd start looking first.
[00:18:08.500]I'm looking for fields that might benefit
[00:18:11.770]from a higher soil P level.
[00:18:13.360]And for example wheat is a crop that needs a higher P level
[00:18:17.870]than corn does or soybeans.
[00:18:20.410]So if you're moving a field into a wheat rotation,
[00:18:24.630]raising that soil P level with a manure is a great
[00:18:28.500]and inexpensive way to go.
[00:18:30.610]And crops that need to have a higher P uptake
[00:18:33.430]like a corn silage or irrigated alfalfa.
[00:18:36.840]Those are often the fields you'll get the greatest value.
[00:18:40.330]Now often when we're applying manure.
[00:18:42.630]We're applying to meet multiple years phosphorus
[00:18:48.150]with that application.
[00:18:49.690]So we may need to do a little bit of checking
[00:18:52.080]of how many years it's gonna take to use up that phosphorus
[00:18:56.410]from that manure application.
[00:18:58.310]And we may need to delay return to that field
[00:19:01.360]until we see those P levels dropping back down below
[00:19:05.930]that 30 parts per million.

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Manure's Fertility Value

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