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Holland producer turning poultry manure into compost
by Sue Stuever Battel

When poultry producer Mike Bronkema, of Holland, needed a way to get rid of manure from his family's 79,000 pullets, he looked to composting. Now it looks like Bronkema and his father-in-law, Lyle Veldheer, may be able to move nutrients and make a buck at the same time.

"We need to move our nutrients from our manure farther away," Bronkema said. "To get it farther away, you might as well sell it as compost."

Ottawa County MSU Extension nutrient management agent, Charles Gould, brought the idea home from a conference in Arkansas, where he watched a massive rotating drum turn animal waste into compost in a matter of days.

"I though it had tremendous application for Michigan producers," he said. "It's nutrient value that can be land-applied."

Soon after, Bronkema and Veldheer were on a plane to Texas to visit a poultry farm that composts its manure with the rotating drum.

Though nature does the work, literally turning waste into compost, the unit provides a controlled environment. It is a simple concept: not much more than an insulated steel drum rotating three to four times an hour by chain drive. Inside, it resembles a clothes dryer, with fins on the inner walls to help aerate as it turns. Six sizes are available from BW Organics, Inc., Sulphur Springs, Texas, ranging in price from $15,000 to $134,000. Each should last 20 years. Painted white, "It looks like a giant marshmallow," one onlooker observed.

Bronkema and Veldheer were convinced by what they saw in Texas. They recently took delivery of a composting unit to try on their farm.

A recipe, made up of two parts pullet manure, four parts oak sawdust and one part wood chips, was prepared in a mixer wagon, Feb. 5, then loaded into the drum. For good measure and to really put it to the test, Bronkema threw several pounds of chicken dander and feathers, 57 dead half-pound chickens and an expired 60-pound market hog. By Feb. 9, the unit contained only rich, dark compost - and a few pig ribs. Before the compost is used, it will be piled for about four weeks to cure, then screened.

"It's beautiful stuff that comes out of here," Bronkema noted.

Sawdust and wood chips are added as bulking agents to bring the mixture's moisture level down to 40-60 percent. Corn stalks would also work well.

Making compost, Bronkema said, required holding the material at least 130 degrees Fahrenheit for 72 hours. That level should destroy any pathogens. When the waste turns to compost inside the drum, the temperature begins to gradually rise, then fall, on its own.

Though Bronkema and Veldheer are testing a small unit, the size of their pullet operation will require a 24-cubic-yard unit. They hope to obtain EQIP cost-share money through the Natural Resource Conservation Service, then will lease the larger unit.

"There are lots of different agricultural applications for a unit like this, "extension agent Gould said. He believes the most important use is to process animal mortalities - particularly swine and poultry - though its role in manure management is also significant. "You're completing the loop, so to speak, of nature."

A new Michigan law allows for the composting of dead farm animals.

Gould said a few other west Michigan farmers are composting their manure, but no others in the state use the rotating drum. He believes other composting systems - static piles and windrows - have their place, but also their limitations. The rotating drum allows farmers to manage manure year 'round and with limited space.

"It's going to depend on the producer and how it fits into his operation," he said. "One system is not going to fit everybody. They've got to have a plethora of options."

Marketing the compost

Perhaps the greatest boon for consumers is that composting eliminates the awful spell of offal and other animal byproducts, yet retains the nutrients in a more stable form.

Bronkema and Veldheer plan to capitalize on that fact. As poultry producers, they call their operation Shady Side Farm. When moving compost, their business will be known as L&M Compost Systems, Inc.

"The market we're targeting here is the blueberry industry that we're right on the edge of," Bronkema said. "They need a humus source."

"I've got to get rid of the manure," Bronkema said. "Selling manure, I can't get money from it." By using the composting system and marketing the results, "I can pay for my time it's going to take me to handle it."

Reprinted with permission from Michigan Farm News .