By GINA KINSLOW
LUCAS — Deceased farm animal removal was one among many issues discussed by the Kentucky Agricultural Development Board last week during its annual planning session and regular business meeting at Barren River Lake State Resort Park.
Several board members expressed concern about the issue, which was labeled as being “high profile” earlier this year.
Kentucky counties were allowed to apply for funding through the Deceased Farm Animal Removal Program, which is designed to serve as an interim measure to facilitate the coordination of environmentally sound and cost effective disposal of deceased livestock for Kentucky’s producers. The program will cover expenditures incurred between July 1 and June 30, 2010.
During their meeting, board members discussed the possibility of composting dead animals as a solution and noted that Steve Jacobs with the University of Kentucky is experimenting with animal composting. It was also discussed the probability of counties engaging in regional animal composting.
Board member Sam Lawson, formerly of Glasgow and now of Bowling Green, said there are state laws governing the disposal of dead animals, specifically composting.
“You can’t go out here and think, ‘I can go out here and throw a little sawdust on it and that’s going to compost it,’ and then all of a sudden that dead animal, the remains, go into the water supply and your neighbors are drinking your dead animal. That’s kind of gruesome, but that’s the real world,” he said. “I just want to make sure that if we are start funding something we also have the education component and the legal part right so that we don’t inadvertently help someone break the law and do something wrong. That’s all my concern is.”
Lawson supports the idea of regional composting over composting on individual farms and used the Glasgow Regional Landfill as an example.
“I used to be on the city council so I know all about the landfill. Even though it’s owned by the city of Glasgow, it is a regional landfill. So, it’s got that scope that can do it right and have professionals out there making sure it is done correctly,” he said. “I would rather see dead animal composting done on a regional basis where you’ve got a professional than to have individual farmers, plus I think you would be grouping monies from several different counties together and do a really nice regional dead animals disposal operation. But if you try to set one up on every farm there’s 75,000 farms in Kentucky and 25,000 to 30,000 have animals. There is a practical answer to that too.”
Roger Thomas, executive director of the Governor’s Office of Agricultural Policy, said he believes the agriculture development board reacted positively in creating the interim program enabling counties to use their own monies and other local funds to create a cost share assistance for removing dead animals.
He also said dead animal disposal is an issue everyone that should concern everyone and finding a permanent solution is something that we all should strive to do.
“With the limited resources we have in the ag development fund and the limited resources local government have, it’s going to be a real challenge for us as we move into the future for finding a solution to this problem,” he said.
Thomas believes animal composting as possibilities as a solution.
“I know some of our folks has been to different places where they are doing work with composting. I think even Western Kentucky University has a compositing site,” he said. “I think it’s something that probably won’t work in every county or in every region of the state, but certainly something some regions will be able to implement and solve the problem in their area. Other areas will hopefully find other solutions that will alleviate the problem of deceased farm animals.”
The board is not scheduled to take any action on the issue until the spring.
