Compost Bedded Pack Barn - An Environmentally Friendly Combination of Waste Storage & Animal Housing

The purpose of this award is for the grantee to construct two compost bedded pack barns, an environmentally friendly combination of waste storage and animal housing for use by dairy cows. The compost bedded pack system seeks to exploit the benefits of storage, nutrient retention, application timing while minimizing or eliminating odor, spills, etc. This system will eliminate liquid manure storage, its costs and hazards. Seventy-five to eighty percent of daily manure production is captures on the pack itself. Therefore housing and manure storage are one unit. Since the bedded pack is part and parcel of the barn it is roofed. The texture of the compost when it is spread is much like damp potting soil. This is stable product that will have no runoff as would liquid.