Our range of livestock feed starts with a straightforward wholecrop Wheat or Barley, ideal as a maintenance ration, a Crimped Wheat and wholecrop Bean mix that is ideal for supplementing silage or Straw to a professionally formulated complete TMR Beef finisher ration, all that’s needed to fatten for market.
All crops are grown in our agroforestry system which places nutrition for the soil and crops as the centre for attention with reduced need for chemical inputs. We therefore can offer locally grown protein feeds with the added convenience of Orkel bales which yield less wastage, efficient transport and feeding, easy storage and convenient for feeding. By crimping grain and fermenting wholecrop we optimise nutritional availability within the feed sample.
We first started making soil improvers as a reaction to transport excess Phosphorus from our farm that had built up in our soil due to the addition of poultry muck. For some years we had been making compost using poultry litter and whatever carbon rich sources were available but it soon became apparent to me that there were inefficiencies within the system. Aerobic compost heats up which to my mind represents a loss of energy. As the compost is created, the mass of the pile reduces by approximately 40%. This surely is another loss from the system in the form of volatilisation of Carbon dioxide and Ammonia gases from stable Ammonium and carbon. So we turned to experimenting with facultative bacteria which can be effective in aerobic and anaerobic conditions.
So we have put together a concept where nutrient is retained within the poultry litter and transformed into soil improver by added bacteria with food supplements. This occurs under anaerobic fermentation within the bales. As with all Orkel bales, there are benefits with transportation, storage and sanitation.
