CowPots, Cow Manure and Fiber Flower Pots - Made in America!
Tired of Too Many Plastic Flower Pots Stacked in the Garden Shed, Garage or in the Back Yard? American-Made CowPots May Be a Better Way!
Matt and Ben Freund, two brothers raising 235 Holsteins on a 350 acre farm in Connecticut, have invented a newcomer to the garden scene - a patent-pending CowPot. Having plenty of cow manure and searching for a way to use some of it in an environmentally-friendly manner, they put together some ideas for their CowPot. Made of dried and deodorized cow manure fibers, it is 100% biodegradable, eco-friendly and it's straight from the barnyard. Time-saving, it's odor-free and non toxic. It reduces horticulture plastics in landfills while at the same time recycling some of the dairy barn waste. An added plus is the beneficial, cultivator earthworms that are attracted to the planting hole where the CowPot is fast decomposing.
U.S. Department of Agriculture - and the CowPot idea!
After contacting the U.S. Department of Agriculture with their idea, the brothers received positive feedback and help through grant programs. Early experiments involved working on compressing the CowPots with the kitchen toaster oven. Creativity exists everywhere!
The odor-free. non-toxic CowPot - how is it made?
The cow manure is dried, composted, mixed with some natural fibers and pressed into garden pot shapes. They will last for months in the greenhouse or even on the windowsill and really get to doing the job when they are planted into the soil where they break down fast. Root trauma is greatly reduced as the roots will grow right though the CowPots, thereby, adding nutrition to the soil. Because cow manure retains moisture, go slow in the
watering department - a little goes a long way!
Cow manure trivia!
A cow makes about 150 lbs of manure daily with 65-70% of this being water. Jerseys produce only about 60% as much as holsteins. The different types of manure handling systems for freestall barns are: manual scraping, flush systems and automatic alley scrapers.
Is the price right?
The first marketable CowPots were produced in 2007 for the next garden-growing season. In some places, a 12 pack of 4 inch CowPots can be purchased for $9.95. CowPots are pots you plant in your organic garden, just like the well-known peat pots. There are no plastic pots to recycle or toss in landfills.
CowPots are a good and new-idea for the environment and the consumer!
Sources:
www.gardeners.com/?Cowpots-transplant-pots/?37-034RS,default,pd.html (comments from consumers)
www.neseed.com/4_?CowPots_made_from_?Cow_?Manure_p/?63100.htm
www.greenisuniversal.com/blog/home-energy/?turning-cow-poop-into-flower-p.php
www.nytimes.com/2009/03/01/nyregion/connecticut/?0301colct.html
wiki.answers.com/Q/How_?much_?manure_?does_a_?cow_?produce_per_?day
www.epa.gov/agriculture/ag101/?dairymanure.html
www.tinybirdsorganics.com/Cow-Pots.html (Pictures of CowPots in use)
www.nrcs.usda.gov/feature/buffers/​conn.html
Published by Rue Cooper
Rue Cooper is a free lance writer living in Pennsylvania. She watches a lot of television shows and old comedy movies. She is interested in homeschooling, religions, biography, science, history, world cultu... View profile
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4 Comments
Post a CommentGood job :) I would buy them, cheers ;)
This sounds like a good idea! Very creative.
very interesting, Rue.. I never heard of this before
This sounds really pretty interesting. I'm not much into putting pots into the ground, however. I always (even in the case of peat) remove plants from pots before planting, despite instructions otherwise. I like the idea of using them for houseplants indoors.