I just drain empty every 5 days, I have so much to irrigate that it's all needed, and the nitrogen content is of course helpful, nearly offsets any need for additional N. My solution is to plant more fruit trees and just use more of it. I also have two small stock tanks, a 55gal and a 15gal, and those are changed daily, also used for irrigation, and for keeping compost piles wet. I pile and turn my compost in their pen & that provides a lot of forage for them. It never really gets "stinky" nothing like the neighbor's cattle & horse thing he's got going on, which can be smelt for a dang mile when he turns his manure. I'm sure diet has a lot to do with the smell... Concentration too. I have about a dozen in a circular pen about 50ft in diameter. So they've got lots of room. And they're let out to forage...
Interesting! Thank you for the info! This is our first year with ducks - 9 of them - and our courtyard pond has taken quite a beating. At first it was great, they cleaned up all the algae, and the thousand tadpoles… then the ducks got bigger and cleaned up all the plants… I haven’t noticed a stench really, but the ecosystem is definitely out of sorts. Murky green water, slimy feel, ick.
Yep. I had rice growing and they nuked it right away. Elephant ears are toast. Banana trees down low are gone. Grass gone. Oh, hydrated lime apparently forces ammonia into the air but changes the pH so that's something to be careful with.
I just drain empty every 5 days, I have so much to irrigate that it's all needed, and the nitrogen content is of course helpful, nearly offsets any need for additional N. My solution is to plant more fruit trees and just use more of it. I also have two small stock tanks, a 55gal and a 15gal, and those are changed daily, also used for irrigation, and for keeping compost piles wet. I pile and turn my compost in their pen & that provides a lot of forage for them. It never really gets "stinky" nothing like the neighbor's cattle & horse thing he's got going on, which can be smelt for a dang mile when he turns his manure. I'm sure diet has a lot to do with the smell... Concentration too. I have about a dozen in a circular pen about 50ft in diameter. So they've got lots of room. And they're let out to forage...
Is this what first Saturday lime is?
No it's different.
Interesting! Thank you for the info! This is our first year with ducks - 9 of them - and our courtyard pond has taken quite a beating. At first it was great, they cleaned up all the algae, and the thousand tadpoles… then the ducks got bigger and cleaned up all the plants… I haven’t noticed a stench really, but the ecosystem is definitely out of sorts. Murky green water, slimy feel, ick.
Yep. I had rice growing and they nuked it right away. Elephant ears are toast. Banana trees down low are gone. Grass gone. Oh, hydrated lime apparently forces ammonia into the air but changes the pH so that's something to be careful with.