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One Man’s Toilet Water is Another Man’s Organic Farm

Michael Smith | January 10, 2022 11:28 am

Climate Change

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US Economics

One Man’s Toilet Water is Another Man’s Organic Farm, Michael Smith, Agricultural Economist and Farmer

In my search to find sustainable sources of organic material to turn into viable soil modification vectors, I had been struggling to source material to add to the Padina sands that are in abundance in our lands.

See, in late 2020 we had five tons of compost brought in all at once and we scattered it here and there. Before that we had brought in about a ton or two in the test field to see how much we needed to push it to get the soil right. A year into the test plot rendered us this:

Which ended up maturing into this:

Five year old for scale.

Cucurbits really don’t care too much about soil quality as long as it is well draining and not prone to fungal activity. A little nitrogen here and there should do the trick to perk them up, but typically they are happy campers with very little. However, with these Cinderella pumpkins, 60 pounds a piece is a bit excessive.

What’s behind all of this? Chamber pots! Sludge from the wastewater plant, combined with the tree waste from yard clippings, tree trimming, and the city parks department. If you need help from a tree services in your area, contact an expert now!

Not to worry, this compost is tested by the state lab in Austin for pathogens on an ongoing basis.

There is an arduous process in place and the gents who make it are passionate about the quality and safety, much like any compost facility (even our own). And because this is all waste byproduct, this black gold is very inexpensive at a whole $28 a ton plus my time and trailer, as opposed to 2020 where we spent $1,200 getting five tons trucked in from Houston. Sourcing inputs can sometimes have an expensive education. Having neighbors helps, if only I had asked sooner. Gardeners and farmers alike, call a wastewater facility, see where the sludge goes, it might end up in a facility that can produce you with an abundance of organic material to grow produce from, in an inexpensive, and sustainable way.

1 Comment

rjs says:

January 27, 2022 at 8:34 pm

here’s something i just ran into you might want to think about, or not…

Researchers find tradeoff between water quality and emissions on the farm – Conservation practices relating to water quality have gained a lot of attention lately, but it’s also important to know how they might affect emissions of nitrous oxide, an important greenhouse gas contributing to climate change,” says Giovani Preza-Fontes, who worked on the study as a doctoral student in the Department of Crop Sciences at U of I. “Ours is one of the first studies to evaluate the nitrogencycle more holistically.”

As greenhouse gases go, nitrous oxide is a doozy. With a potency 298 times that of carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide is released when soil microbes metabolize nitrogen, an essential nutrient required to grow corn. When soils warm up in the spring and summer, microbes get to work on any nitrogen not taken up by crops, turning a portion into the powerful greenhouse gas.

Some farmers have moved away from the fall anhydrous application, splitting nitrogen between early spring and mid-season. Proponents say this split application is more precise, delivering the exact amount of nitrogen crops need in the moment and leaving less in the soil to be lost in drainage water. Similarly, farmers plant cover crops to take up any excess nitrogen after crops are harvested.

Preza-Fontes, et al, measured nitrous oxide emissions in corn fields across three seasons. They mimicked various conservation practices, including a pre-season nitrogen application only; split nitrogen applications in spring and at the V6 or V7 corn growth stage; split nitrogen plus a cereal rye cover crop; or no added nitrogen. They found shifting from pre-season to in-season split nitrogen application did not influence nitrous oxide levels in any of the three years. Instead, nitrous oxide spiked in plots with cover crops.

“For all three years, we saw greater daily spikes in nitrous oxide emissions with the combination of in-season split nitrogen application and cover crops, but those spikes did not translate into greater cumulative emissions, except for one year. I think this pattern indicates there is a potential for greater nitrous oxide emissions when we incorporate a cereal rye cover crop into our cropping systems,” Preza-Fontes says.

Why would cereal rye increase nitrous oxide emissions? Simply put, it can create the perfect conditions for nitrous oxide production. The dead plant matter is a massive dinnerplate for soil microbes, providing extra carbon for microbial activity. The plant residue also helps to create an oxygen-limiting environment, a key condition for nitrous oxide production.