Composting Livestock on the Farm When Animals Pass Away
Book: Backyard Farming: Composting | Author: Kim Pezza | ISBN: 978-1-57826-587-9 | Hatherleigh Press, 2015
Okay. This is the chapter most composting books skip over, and honestly, I get why. It’s not a comfortable topic. But if you keep animals on a farm, death is part of the deal. It just is. And when it happens, you need a plan for what comes next. Pezza addresses this head-on in Chapter 5, and I respect that.
Why Not Just Bury or Haul Them Away?
When a farm animal dies, you basically have three options: rendering, burial, or composting.
Rendering means a company picks up the body and processes it. Sounds simple, but it’s expensive. You might have to store the body for days waiting for pickup. And some rendering plants won’t even accept animals that died on their own. They only want slaughterhouse material. So that option falls apart fast.
Burial seems like the obvious choice, but it’s got legal problems. Some areas have strict rules about burying animal remains. You have to stay far from wells and groundwater. The hole has to be deep enough so nothing digs it up. Depending on where you live, it might not even be legal.
Composting is the third option, and it’s the one Pezza recommends. It saves money, keeps everything on-farm, handles the animal respectfully, and nothing goes to waste. The remains break down into rich compost that goes right back into the soil. Full circle.
I’ll be real: when I first read this section, my reaction was basically “wait, you can do that?” But the more you think about it, the more it makes sense. This is what happens in nature anyway. Composting just manages the process so it’s faster, cleaner, and controlled.
Where to Set Up
Before you do anything, call your local extension office. There may be regulations about livestock composting in your area. Get that sorted first.
For the site itself, Pezza lays out some common-sense rules:
- Stay away from wells, streams, rivers, and lakes
- Pick high ground that won’t flood
- Manage runoff so nothing flows toward water sources
- Keep it out of your neighbors’ line of sight (just be considerate)
You can build a three-sided shelter with a roof over it, kind of like a massive covered bin. The size depends on what kind of animals you’re working with. Small animals like poultry can be composted in groups. Larger animals need more space and materials.
The Step-by-Step Process
The method uses the same principles as regular composting: temperature, time, and moisture balance. The main material you need is dry wood mulch. Wood chips, sawdust, or shavings all work. This stuff absorbs decomposition fluids and keeps odors down.
Here’s how it works:
- Lay a 2 to 3 foot deep bed of dry wood mulch on a flat surface
- Place the animal on the bed
- Cover with 4 feet of wood mulch
- Shape everything into a cone so water sheds off
- Make sure there’s at least 2 feet of mulch on all sides
For ruminant animals (cows, goats, sheep), you can puncture the rumen to prevent bloating. That’s a practical detail that matters.
The cone shape is important. You’re basically building a mound that keeps rain from soaking in and lets air circulate. When the cone starts sinking inward, that means composting is nearly done. If the animal becomes visible at any point, just add more dry material on top.
How Long Does It Take?
A large cow or horse takes about 3 months. A broiler chicken, roughly 30 days. At the end, only bones remain, and even those are brittle enough to crumble.
Getting the Moisture Right
This is where the science matters. Animal carcasses are dense. They’re high in nitrogen and about 60% water. That’s a lot of moisture concentrated in one spot.
Your carbon materials (the wood mulch) should be at about 50% moisture by weight. Pezza describes a squeeze test: grab a handful and squeeze it. It should stick together slightly with just a few drops coming out. That’s the sweet spot.
Too much moisture creates ammonia, methane, and bad smells. Too little slows everything down to a crawl. Getting this balance right is the difference between a clean process and a smelly mess.
What Finished Livestock Compost Looks Like
When it’s done, you’ll find:
- No remaining tissue
- No odor
- Brittle bones that break easily
- Rich brown color
- Crumbly texture, just like regular finished compost
One important safety note: unless the animal died from spongiform pathogens (like BSE/mad cow disease), all livestock can be composted safely. Most viruses become inactive between 122 and 144 degrees Fahrenheit, and most compost piles reach those temperatures naturally.
Pezza’s Personal Experience
The author shares that she composted a large pet dairy goat and found the process odor-free and no harder than regular composting. That firsthand account adds a lot of credibility. This isn’t just theory from a textbook. She actually did it and confirmed it works the way she describes.
My Take
I won’t pretend this is a fun topic. It’s heavy. But I think there’s something genuinely respectful about an animal returning to the soil of the farm where it lived. It beats loading a body into a truck and paying someone else to deal with it. And it beats digging a hole and hoping you don’t hit a water table.
If you’re farming and keeping animals, this is practical knowledge you’ll eventually need. Better to understand the process now than to figure it out during an already difficult moment.
What’s Next
The next post moves into the chemistry side of composting, specifically how carbon and nitrogen ratios work and why they matter for every type of composting pile.