Monday, February 23, 2015

Managing Agricultural Waste: Reducing Flies & Odors

By Lianne Derocco


Dealing with agricultural waste is always a big issue for all types of livestock farmers. This includes handling swine waste management issues that occur in manure pits and manure lagoons. Two common problems include excessive odors and an abundance of flies. In the following article, we take a look at these two nuisances and discuss how to improve pig manure management at your hog farm.

Flies are definitely a huge nuisance on most hog farms and dairy farms. Flies are not just annoying; they can spread a wide variety of bacteria and disease. For instance, if you have isolated sick hogs in one section of your hog farm, flies from the isolation area can carry infection from the sick hogs over to your healthy animals. The common housefly and the stable fly are the two types you most often will encounter on a livestock farm and these can carry diseases as well as parasites.

One way to reduce the amount of flies near the animals themselves is ensuring that manure is quickly removed from where your animals defecate. You are less likely going to be affected by flies if barns or other containment areas are kept as dry and clean as possible. Often if you have a smaller hog farm or even just a very small hobby type of farm, fly paper or special fly traps can be used as well to keep flies to a minimum. Another method in reducing the amount of flies around your waste lagoon or pit is by using some type of natural hog manure treatment.

Odors also are another common problem, and while it's impossible to eliminate odors completely, there are some natural pig manure management products that can reduce the odors. These odors aren't just smelly; they can be toxic and might contain chemicals that can be harmful for the surrounding human population. People who live near large factory farms with large waste lagoons often report increases in bronchial infections, asthma, colds and lung infections. To reduce the severity of this problem, it can be helpful to apply an effective pig manure treatment.

One natural product to consider is Agra Sphere, which helps with swine waste management. This product is designed to reduce deep pit foaming and sludge, as well as to liquefy slurry and prevent issues such as crusting. Excessive sludge and crusting can increase the odors and the amount of flies around your waste pit or lagoon.

Agra Sphere is a completely natural and biodegradable product. You simply toss an adequate number of spheres onto the waste in your pit or lagoon and they immediately will go work, eating away at the waste solids. This agricultural waste product contains only naturally occurring bacterial microbes and no chemicals so you won't be adding any more toxins to the environment.




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