Banning the Spreading of Liquid Manure on Frozen Ground

Background:  Manure can be a natural and environmentally beneficial source of fertilizer for growing crops when the manure is applied under the right conditions. However, how and when that manure is spread can directly affect the quality of our streams and lakes.

Some of the largest livestock factories in Wisconsin spread liquid manure when the ground is frozen or covered with snow – with dire consequences for our surface waters. Spreading liquid manure on frozen or snow-covered ground can increase the risk that the manure will run off the field where it has been spread. Liquid and solid manure that has been applied on snow-covered ground may run off the field during spring snow-melts, damaging a lake, river or stream.

Midwest Environmental Advocates has been using the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (prohibiting “open dumps”) and the Clean Water Act to hold livestock factories accountable for spreading manure on frozen ground and allowing it to spill into public waters. See Treml v. Stahl, Concerned Farmers and Neighbors of the Town of Hixton v. Sedelbauer Farms, Inc., and Sierra Club v. Maple Ridge Dairy. However, given how often spreading liquid manure on frozen ground has polluted our surface waters, the DNR should simply ban the practice altogether.

It makes sense, environmentally and economically, to apply manure when it is more likely to stay on the field, not when the ground is frozen and snow-covered and when the risk of runoff is highest.

One of Midwest Environmental Advocates’ policy goals is to secure a ban on the spreading of liquid and solid manure by livestock factories on snow-covered and frozen ground. We are urging the DNR to rewrite its regulations (NR 243) on livestock factories to prohibit this practice.

If you agree that the DNR should ban winter manure spreading, email Todd Ambs, DNR Division of Water Administrator, and tell the DNR that it is time to ban liquid and solid manure spreading on frozen and snow-covered ground.

Success! The Natural Resources Board unanimously approved new standards for Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations that spread manure on frozen and snow-covered ground. Click here to read media coverage of the hearing and manure spreading issues.


Above is a DNR photograph of manure ponding and runoff that continued
weeks after the manure was spread on melting snow and saturated ground.


This picture was taken in February of 2002. A factory farm spread 230,000 gallons of manure on a 32 acres, causing runoff from a crop field into a neighbor’s wood lot and eventually into a tributary of the Big Eau Pleine River .


Winter spreading of manure caused a spill on the Yellow River (above)
in 2003, covering the frozen river in manure.

  
News and Additional Resources
 

Click here for an archive of media articles on manure spills around Wisconsin.

New! Watch selections of Wisconsin media on manure contamination:

Click here to read the department of justice release 'State Settles Well-Contamination Lawsuit in Dodge County"

Click here to watch and interview with MEA's Andrew Hanson on the importance of regulating manure spreading.

Click here to read talking points on the DNR’s proposed restrictions on frozen ground manure spreading.  You can use these to help you prepare your testimony at the May Natural Resources Board hearing!

Click here to learn "What is a CAFO?"

Click here to read a MEA fact sheet on manure spreading and its consequences for public health and taxpayers.

Click here Read a Kewaunee County Land Conservation Department Letter to Senator Alan Lasee about the risks of spreading liquid manure on frozen and snow-covered ground.

MEA has joined Brown County in requesting that Governor Doyle declare a state of emergency in southern Brown County to help people who have no safe, reliable water supply.  Click here to read more.

Click here to read a letter from a Farm Bureau member to the Wisconsin Farm Bureau, urging them to support efforts to prevent manure-related well contamination.

The Brown County Land Conservation Department requests the Governor Doyle declare a State of Emergency in southeastern Brown County due to multiple well contaminations there. Read it here.

Read MEA's Comments on behalf of several local, state, and national environmental organizations on the DNR’s proposal to revise NR 243, the CAFO manure storage and spreading rules, to comply with the Clean Water Act. 

Click here to read "Family Farms Deserve Support, Not a Blame-Game," a guest editorial by attorney Andrew Hanson.

Click here to review the DNR’s proposal to ban winter spreading on frozen and snow covered ground and require at least 6 months worth of manure storage.

Click here to read Andrew Hanson's opinion editorial on NR 243 regulations, published in several Wisconsin papers.

Click for a map of factory farm locations

Click for a map of well contaminations reported to the DNR.
* Data compiled by Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources
* This map is not an exhaustive list of all manure-contaminated wells; it includes only those that have been recently brought to DNR's attention and have been tested. 

Click here to read a list of runoff incidents, compiled by the DNR, caused by spreading manure on frozen and snow covered-ground.

Click here to review a summary of scientific and government reports, also compiled by the DNR, that discuss the dangers of spreading manure on frozen and snow-covered ground.

Click to view maps, created by the Izaak Walton League of America, of Wisconsin counties affected by manure spills fish kills over a 5-year, 10-year and 15-year period. Click here to access the Izaak Walton League of America's fish kill database.

Click here to read the final report of Dane County's Manure Task Force.

Click here to read Brown County's proposal for winter manure spreading guidelines.