Maria Thun Compost
April 12, 2020
Thank you to Robert Kathmann of Cat Moon Hollow Farms, East Meredith, NY, for remembering to alert me to when the organic in nature — pregnant cow manure was ready to pick up (right).
What’s this for, you all ask? Here I go again, you say. It’s a perfect time and no better time than right now.
What I am making is for the land, plants and microbes that take care of me. I’m returning their gifts with gifts for them that will help them flourish, connect and replicate for the goodness of the whole on this space.
This gift is called Maria Thun Compost. Go here to learn more.
The last time I made this was 10 years ago — after reading and compiling the whole book Secrets of the Soil into workable chart form, There was no looking back. I had to live with this Nature-giving method.
What you see here in the first photo is 25 gallons of raw, pregnant-cow manure from Robert Kathmann cows in my back yard garden. It is on a tarp so as to not leach its goodness into the Earth — yet. Photo at left is said cow manure with 100 organic ground eggshells (probably most of them from Diane Frances) and 9 oz basalt ready to be mixed into it.
Below right is the manure all blended with the egg shells and basalt, and ready to be put into a 55-gallon wooden drum ¾ of the way in the earth that you see below left. I purchased that wooden drum 10 years ago at Wood Bull Antiques. Yes, it is ¾ into the ground. My son Nate dug the hole deep for us. But!!! Kaela Van Breevoort Reed, Stephanie Hertel, Rebecca Alexander and Andrea Menke helped remove the foot or so of snow and started the digging of this deep hole 10 years ago at this very same time of the year. Vesti Misner hadn’t arrived yet but was just a couple of weeks away from studenthood. :-)
With the manure in the barrel, I placed BD 502, 503, 504, 505, 506 into 5 holes in the surface of this manure. Next is a spray of BD 507 that goes inside and around the outside of barrel (read the link I gave above in first paragraph). Then we put a lid that is a small cute little wooden barn door, then a stone is put on top so no creatures make a visit. This is also sprayed with BD 507.
In 6 weeks students will remove contents. Stir manure for 10 minutes. Replace manure back into barrel for another 6 weeks, at which point students will remove again and this time store in large ceramic pots (and of course everyone will take some home too). These ceramic pots will be stored in an underground earthen space that Jerrid Leo and Jason Lindow dug. Daniel Caban built its wooden covering 2 years ago. Around these pots is moist peat moss surrounding the containers. This is a very special place made for these very special earth-honoring nutrients.
I do believe this is the barrel’s last year of use. Maybe there’s a Wood Bull Antiques visit needed again. But maybe I can find one in our community instead.
Please do give me a call to come over for some Maria Thun Compost. Social distancing honored. I’ll show you how to collect from its earthen place. I still have many gallons from 10 years ago. All is still good. All is ready to use. All come with directions on how to use and even how to make, if you so choose. Plus, I’d love to do an exchange for other things I may need and you have. All other preps are available too, in the same way, with directions and exchanging or . . . who knows.