Dairies to Berries: Dairy-Manure Derived Fertilizers for Use in Raspberry and Blueberry Cropping Systems – Evaluation for Agronomic, Soil Health and Food Safety Efficacy

With ongoing increases in herd productivity and concentration over the last half century, the dairy industry has had to manage increasing concentrations of manure. Handling, storage and application of these manures and the associated nutrients to soils have in some areas contributed to air and water quality impairment. The distribution of these nutrients to adjacent horticultural farms, where nutrients are needed, has been limited due to costs of handling and transport, problematic nutrient balance, and food safety concerns. This project: assessed the commercialization of new nutrient-recovery technologies that aim to recover nitrogen, phosphorus, and other nutrients in a concentrated form that can be easily transported off farm; utilized red raspberries and blueberries as the test crop by using manure-derived fertilizer products, facilitating movement of nutrients from “dairies to berries” to improve watershed nutrient balance, soil quality, and horticultural production; tested whether these products might exacerbate food safety risks through on-farm trials; quantified the willingness to pay for such products to support local watershed-level marketing of manure-derived fertilizers; and explored the ability of such products to meet nearby crop demands through an analysis of county-wide nutrient flows.