[AT] A really stupid question...

[Dick Day]

Several times a month, when weather permits, I will scrape horse manure in 
the corral to a large mound. Once the mound dries out enough, I will spread 
it in the pastures.

The last time I scraped the corral, we also cleaned out stalls and some of 
the barn as well, mixing in a good amount of hay, which is not normally in 
the mound.

Today, I used my Boomer loader to start loading my New Idea spreader and 
noticed what I thought was dust coming up from the mound.  After a few more 
loads, the smoke was pouring from the mound.  I also remember thinking that 
it smelled like silage, an aroma not normally associated with this task :)

I assume that the hay was beginning the fermentation process.  I quickly 
unloaded the spreader for fear that the wooden floor in there would catch 
fire.  I abandoned the project thinking it was not a good idea to be loading 
smoldering material onto the wood floor of a spreader.

Was I over-reacting? Could there have been a fire?  Would this have hurt the 
pasture? When I walked over the the mound, on the side where I had taken 
several buckets from, it felt like a large outdoor furnace, the heat was 
very noticeable.

How long will it be before the process is complete?  The mound is sitting 
away from all structures and fences.

Should I break the mound up and spread it around?

Thanks,


Dick Day