When to spread the muck?

[Mel Darke]

When is the best time to put horse manure from my heap on to our allotment? I made the heap last autumn and covered it with plastic. It is not the ideal sort as a lot of it is sawdust.

Also, if I don't have enough if I used freshly delivered muck how long should I wait before attempting to grow any thing there?

[Beryl]

If it is well rotted you can spread it on any time. Sawdust rots down making it nice and crumbly.

I would never put fresh manure on. I have seen it done but this time of the year the weeds and grass will soon grow away through it. You will only make extra work forself later in the spring. Remember horses eat grass and the seeds they have digested need to germinate and be killed off.
Pile it up somewhere till the spring then use it for mulching.

Beryl.

[jane E]

Spread fresh (or any) manure out over plastic. Hoe off the weeds as they appear, which might be in mild winter weather or in spring. Use it for mulching. I cover my raised beds with whatever compost/manure I've got during the winter. It prevents weeds and the worms pull it down and in the spring it only needs lightly forking in and you've got a seed or planting bed.

[Mike Vogel]

May I suggest that, although Beryl is right, you can solve the problem by covering the frershly spread manure with cardboard? Then the weeds and grass will have no light and so will not grrow through the manure. On the other hand, the worms will have a field day pulling all that lovely top-dressing down into the soil, the more so as the cardboard will be keeping the soil a little warmer, and worms work more vigorously in warmer soil.

Good luck
mike

[glallotments]

Don't forget to ask the right questions when sourcing your manure so you don't fall foul of contamination as we did last year.
Read http://glallotments.blogspot.com/2008/10/thinking-of-obtaining-manure.html