While slurry is normally only used in agricultural environments, it is possible to use this nutrient rich fertiliser around the house to encourage the healthy growth of gardens and plants.
Let’s take a closer look at slurry, and how it can be used to benefit non-agricultural land and gardens.

What is Slurry?

For many years, slurry was produced in a slurry pit, a hole or effluent storage tank which collects all the animal waste. This waste is usually cow manure from a farm, together with other unusable organic matter. This organic matter can be anything from hay to the water run off that’s collected after washing down stables, barns and dairies.

Over a long period of time, this mixture is converted into a fertiliser that can be spread on agricultural fields to fertilise whatever is growing there.

Some dairy farmers are now choosing to use anaerobic digesters to turn cow manure into energy. This results in a bio-slurry that retains all the original nutrients to make an extremely potent organic fertiliser, while reducing the problems with odours and toxic gases experienced with traditional slurry.

How Can Slurry Be Used to Help your Garden?

As a natural and nutritious organic fertiliser, slurry helps grass and other crops to grow and thrive. This makes it a great natural resource for house and farm gardens and any other type of land with plants that will benefit from the nutrients contained within the slurry.

You may want to use the methods employed by farmers on agricultural land when you apply slurry to your garden. This can be done by injecting the slurry close to the roots of your plants for maximum absorption, simply spreading it over the land. However, the slurry can also be dug into the soil. By adding slurry to new gardens before you begin to plant, extra nutrients can be added to the soil to enhance its ability to retain water.

Benefits of using Slurry on your Garden or Land

It is estimated that you can boost your crop yield by up to 25% when you use slurry on your land, rather than manure. Furthermore, unlike chemical fertilisers, slurry is completely organic and it’s a great way to recycle waste products that occur naturally on a farm.

What to Consider when using Slurry as a Fertiliser

If you choose to use slurry to fertilise your garden or plants, there are a few things that you need to keep in mind, depending on the type of slurry you use:

Firstly, as traditional slurry decomposes it produces deadly gases. This is not just a problem in the slurry pits, where breathing apparatus should be worn, but its spreading is also restricted during certain weather and environmental conditions. However, these issues are no longer a problem with the introduction of bio-slurry.

As an organic fertiliser that contains no chemicals and is made purely from products that would otherwise go to waste, slurry is a very viable option for use in gardens. And, with the introduction of new bio-slurry, which is fully fermented and odourless, it has become a safe and eco-friendly alternative to other forms of fertiliser.