Can a Grain Producer Afford to Not Use Hog Manure?

By Mark Wilbur 

When I visit with hog producers, I can’t help but notice how grateful they are for the value of manure their hogs produce.  Some hog producers proclaim the value of hog manure is similar to gold.  I know using hog manure to fertilize a crop is cost effective, but is it really that big of a deal?   I had no idea until I started looking at the numbers.  I hope you’ll read on because I think you’ll be equally impressed.

I had been out of touch with the escalation of fertilizer costs.  When I checked current prices for commercial N, P and K, and did some calculating using hog manure in their place, the numbers were stunning.  I used a spreadsheet made available by the University of Minnesota.  You can download it for free at: http://swroc.coafes.umn.edu/Bob/docs/manurwkst.htm  or, go to Winn Coop’s website and go to the grain bid page and I’ll post the link there.  It appears to me that the spreadsheet takes into account everything for both sides of the equation, giving you a true picture of what hog manure could mean to you.  You can plug in your own numbers on the spreadsheet.  The numbers that I used (fertilizing for 200 bushel corn using current fertilizer prices) showed a value/savings of over 130 dollars per acre using hog manure in place of commercial fertilizer.  How many acres are you currently raising?  100?  200?  1,000 or more?  It doesn’t take many acres before the total dollar figure is staggering.

Not only does applying hog manure to your crop ground make excellent sense economically, it appears to be good for your soil too.  “Liquid swine manure applied and incorporated into the soil reduced runoff volume during the growing season compared to soil with no applied manure, indicating that the manure improves infiltration in the soil, independent of effects of residue cover on the soil surface.  There was also a reduction in sediment loss during summer runoff associated with applied manure.”  (Application Rate of Liquid Swine Manure: Effects on Runoff, Sediment and Phosphorous Transport conducted by N.C. Hansen, J.F. Moncrief, and M.A. Schmitt of the University of Minnesota and P.D. Gessel, Utah Dept. of Environmental Quality, Division of Water Quality.  P. 12.)  The study was located at the University of Minnesota West Central Research and Outreach Center in Morris, Minnesota.

Maybe the rising costs of crop inputs such as commercial fertilizer, land/rent, fuel, equipment and so on are taking a bite out of your bottom line and it is making you rethink how you do things.  Perhaps you feel this hog manure thing makes some sense.  If it does, give me a call at 612-308-9339.  The savings are huge and the opportunities are many.  If you’re not interested in owning hogs yourself, we have local hog producers that are looking for sites on which to build new barns.  We also have producers looking for existing (or new) “outdoor spaces”, like hoop barns, barns with concrete aprons, etc. to raise antibiotic free pork.  If you have an older confinement barn, we have people interested in putting pigs in it also.  So, if you have any site or facility that has the potential for raising hogs, it’s worth taking a look.  Please give me a call.

Thanks for taking the time to read this article and considering hog manure for your grain operation.  And above all, thank you for your patronage.  It is greatly appreciated.