Manure? Compost?

~ This article first appeared in The Leader Vindicator newspaper. ~

Non-farmers frequently refer to ‘compost’ as ‘manure’.  This tendency has my brain leaping through hoops like a dog in a circus. 

I began experimenting with composting several years ago.  As I became more experienced, requests started rolling in from gardeners who wanted manure fertility for their veggies, but lacked manure producing animals.  Hence, The Fragrant Cow Compost Company was born.

I joined online gardening groups in the Pittsburgh area and began advertising Fragrant Cow Compost to the folks in that region.  The fertile soil amendment has proven popular with porch gardeners, homesteaders, and even basement marijuana growers.  The latter I did not expect, but they’re friendly and pay cash, so grow on, you hidden horticulturists.

One consistency stuck out among my compost customers: All of them, apparently, were fixated on manure.  I’d mention saleable compost; they’d call and order manure.  I’d discuss manure as an ingredient, they’d reply as though it was the end product.  ‘Manure compost’, in nonfarm lingo, is automatically shortened to ‘manure’.

Let’s straighten this out. 

Growing up a farm kid, I learned in roughly the first three days of life that ‘manure’ comes out the back of an animal.  Manure stinks.  The smell with saturate clothing, pores, vehicle seats, dogs, babies, hair, your spouse, your house…everything.

Compost, by comparison, does not stink.  Composting is a controlled rotting process that takes place under high heat in the presence of oxygen.  Not all compost contains manure, but compost that does contain manure – as mine does – in no way resembles a smelly pile of poop.  The poop rots, and during the process nutrients from the poop are absorbed in the carbon sponge of the compost pile.  The end product is black, earthy-smelling humus.  Lots of fertility.  No manure.

You can imagine the mental gymnastics I have to perform when someone calls and asks if we have manure. 

Customer: “Hi, I’m calling to order manure.”

Me: “You mean you want compost?”

Customer: “No, no, I want manure.  You know, with the cow poop in it.”

Me: “You want straight cow manure?”

Customer: “No! I want the stuff you advertised with the cow poop in it.”

Me: “That’s compost.”

Customer: “But I want the manure, too…”

Some people insist that they really do want manure, not compost, so they load raw poop in buckets and happily haul it home in their sedans, though I cannot fathom how they avoid asphyxiation during the trip or exile from their family unit upon survival of the journey. 

Still others order manure, yet want nothing at all to do with poop.

A potential customer sent me a text message asking if I still had ‘manure’ available.  I thought I was on to the nonfarmer lingo, so I assumed that she had simply dropped the word ‘compost’ off the end, and I replied that yes, I did have some for sale.  She thought that was wonderful.  So did I.

Then she asked if the manure had cow poop in it.  I had to think about how to answer that one.

I finally responded that yes, it’s manure compost that I sell, so there is indeed manure in the ingredient list.  She was horrified.  There is a dog in her family, you see, and if manure had manure in it the dog might try to eat it.  She decided to stick with mushroom manure.

I was baffled.  Did she mean she wanted poop that had harbored mushrooms?  If so, what was wrong with the poop added to my compost?  Or did she want mushroom compost, which might not contain any manure at all?  When I tried to explain that this isn’t raw poop I’m hustling out the back of a cow to her doorstep, she apparently got ticked off and stopped responding to me.  Text message communication has a way of turning an enthusiast’s explanation into a condescending lecture.  Advice from someone who fails in this department far too often: Think hard before you hit send.

If you call me and order manure, my mind is automatically associating a raw pile of smelly poop.  Yes, I realize that few people actually want smelly poop to take home, but the association is automatic and overwhelming.  Manure is poop. 

If you call me and order compost, we’ll be in better shape because I’ll associate a wonderful, rich soil enhancement with your request.  Remember, though, that the compost contains manure, meaning poop, as an ingredient.  It is, after all, manure compost.

People need to remember that each word has its own singular meaning so we can communicate effectively.  If they did, sales would skyrocket and I’d likely need a crane to load all the compost I’d be selling.  Then I could build a pond, and a crane could live in it.  My arm would get tired from collecting bark to add to the compost pile, so I’d have to arm myself with a trained dog that would bark when it discovered compost ingredients, thus relieving some of my strain.  I’d head over at a clip to clip away the larger materials, because I can’t strain the compost effectively if it’s too coarse.  With this system in place, I could elevate my compost company above the coarse competition and attract a refined customer base that avoids coarse language.

Alas, I believe I am doomed. Nobody respects the meaning of words these days.