 Good afternoon. I am Mary Keena, the livestock environmental management specialist at the Carrington Research Extension Center, and I am here today for the horse mortality management. And that is going to be one of four in our spring 2022 horse management series that we're doing. And so with me today, of course, are my co-host Rachel Wald and Paige Brummond. And so Rachel and Paige were instrumental always in making this happen. And so they'll be in the background, making sure that we keep you guys on mute until the end. So we'll unmute you at the end if you want to ask questions, you're more than welcome to. Otherwise, it just keeps things flowing a little faster. And then, of course, you can always type your questions into the chat and they'll make sure and let us know what's going on there. So today we're talking about horse mortality management. And I also then have a guest with us today who has not talked on one of our webinars yet. So we're really excited to have Krishona Martinson with us today. So Krishona is the professor and extension program leader at University of Minnesota in equine in horse management. And so we're really excited to have her with us today. So how it's going to go is I'll start out and and then Krishona will take over and we'll do questions at the end unless Rachel or Paige think there's something to interrupt us for. Before we get rolling. I just want to say hi, we're just really excited to be back with you guys. It's been a year, and we've talked to you a couple times in between just sending you a couple things here and there to let you know that if you have questions, we're more than happy to answer them but it's been pretty quiet. And so we're just really glad you're back and we see a lot of I'm looking at the names list right now and we see a lot of people that are are common and have been here before so that's really exciting. So with that, like I said my name is Mary Keena and I will talk about horse mortality management today so I'm going to start out with just what the approved methods for disposal are are in North Dakota. And so I will talk about that and then we'll roll into a more specific method composting with Krishona. So approved disposal methods for livestock carcasses in North Dakota include rendering incineration burial composting landfilling. Burning is also an option however we try to use that only in specific situations. And so you can see there's some situations up on the presentation here. Most often though we try to stick with the ones that are on the left hand side of the slide. So the law states in North Dakota that animals that die for any reason must be disposed of an improved method within 36 hours of death. Something that we do want to avoid so again the burning is technically something that we can do however it's really low on the list of things that our regulators want us to do and so we try to avoid open air burning if we can. We also try to avoid the small city inert landfills. So the smaller ones there are larger ones that are licensed to take livestock mortalities. And so we try to go to those instead. And then of course carcass abandonment. So, leaving an animal carcass out on a section line on a rock pile in a field, basically abandoned is illegal. And so we should not do that. Okay, so we'll just step through a couple of these really quick what they are. And then like I said at the end we'll go into what composting is so rendering. Rendering is a process of converting animal carcasses the pathogen free useful byproducts such as as feed protein so what happens is is exposed to really high temps and pressurized steam. So, the process used to be really, really common. Now it's more so common, maybe more in the south, but in North Dakota and parts of Minnesota, there are rendering trucks that work with our butcher shops. And so we don't actually have rendering that go around and pick up livestock carcasses, unless it's a very specific situation. Incineration is another option for disposal. And so incineration, some people say incineration when they actually mean open air burning. Incineration, however, is an actual technique that uses basically it's like thermal destruction with a high fuel so like propane diesel natural gas. However, the difference between open air burning and using an incinerator is there are actually filters on this unit that make sure they're filtering out some particulates and keeping the air clean and so that's the difference. Incinerators tend to be pretty expensive, expensive to put up expensive to maintain and then you have to have certain permits to use them. And so oftentimes, when they are put up we do have a couple incinerators in the state. Most of them are like the veterinary diagnostic lab for instance uses an incinerator, but that's a constant use whereas some of our other operations I've put them in and have since gone to composting because it's actually easier for them to maintain that. Burial is another option, pretty common, especially pretty common here it's a little hard to do when the ground is frozen unless you pre prepared for that. And oftentimes, you in the horse community, we're not really pre preparing for that because we we don't typically have a lot of mortality happening. And so burial at certain times of the year is a little easier than other times of the year. If we are going to bury we do want to make sure that we're four feet above the groundwater table and then we put four feet of cover on top of that carcass. So that's the key there. And then I talked about municipal solid waste sites and so there are 13 of them in North Dakota. And, and we have a list of those in case you're wondering what they are. Now, I say 13 but individual landfills can actually accept or reject on their own terms. And so it's really important to call beforehand one to make sure they'll accept and to see what their protocol is for receiving that. And then composting. And so composting of course is a naturally occurring process. It's, it's advantages over other methods include lower costs easy to prepare piles. We, I call it above ground burial, because we don't have to dig a hole to do this. And so I'm not going to elaborate on this process I'm going to let persona do that but just composting is something again that basically we're breaking down that animal carcass and the basic elements. So just some quick rule of thumb for site selection whatever you're doing if you're burying if you're going to compost, if we're going to just some things to think about when we're looking for our sites. So, no gravel pits, no sand pits, no excavation areas, no flood plains, nothing that is within specific feet and so on here it's 200 feet it really depends on your state and what your rules are of private water wells public waterways. And so, we want to make sure and then of course, we have to be a certain distance away from streams and lakes. Soil type is also something that we want to keep in mind so sandy soils rapid permeability, more opportunity for leaching clay soils slower permeability less opportunity for leaching. Okay, so with that, we will leave the resources until the end and this will be available for you online. We're going to go ahead and switch to persona. That was a fantastic introduction, just two options that horse owners have for park is disposal and you know, I'm really pleased to be here with NDSU I think NDSU is going to hold a special place in my heart. My oldest daughter right now is highly likely going to NDSU to major in nursing and take advantage of some of the horse opportunities there mostly college rodeo so I think I will be visiting NDSU a lot in the next coming years. So, this is a collaborative project that we have worked on that really kind of necessitated out of a huge need in Minnesota in our horse industry. All of you realize that horses are really unique to other livestock they have a much longer lifespan than cattle or sheep. There's about, you know, 7.3 million horses in the entire US, our annual mortality rate is about 1.4%. So that means that there's 100,000 horses that you know die annually that we need to properly dispose of that carcass. So we've already went through these rendering burial incineration and composting in Minnesota landfill is sort of only allowed through the rendering process. But interestingly enough, the reason this project started was about three or four years ago, one of our largest render sent out a letter to all of our vet hospitals, saying that they were no longer taking chemically euthanized horses, or horses that had been injected with for example like sodium pentobarbital. Well, that's a huge issue in the horse industry because a lot of our survey work shows that about 85 to 90% of horses are chemically euthanized because they're not going into the food system, you know, like cattle and hogs and poultry are. We talked about the complications with burial and in northern climate incineration is costly. And really the biggest thing that people kind of veer away from with composting is just that it's simply and you know it's not familiar. I just want to take a moment. If you guys have any questions at any time, please ask them and Mary and Rachel and page just just unmute and interrupt me because sometimes the question is best sort of addressed. You know, while we are there so please ask questions throughout I'm happy to be interrupted. So what we did is first we actually did a survey to see if horse owners would even be interested in it we looked at horse owners and veterinarians. Then we actually composted horses both in the summer. In the fall, not really winter but more summer and fall composting work had been done previously but a lot of it had been done in Florida and obviously the climate in Minnesota and North Dakota is vastly different than Florida. And I wasn't even sure if we could compost horses during the winter months for example. So what we did is we did two surveys one for veterinarians and one for horse owners and we had a great response to the surveys. Surprisingly the horse owners that are represented in the gold text, you know, 86% of them preferred the horses were chemically euthanized followed by burial. The veterinarians again 84% you know preferred chemical euthanasia and 45% of them preferred burial in only five or 10% had ever even considered composting. So, when, when we asked okay you've considered it but have you actually used it very few people had used it, and we dug into deeper why people were looking. So, we do have a commercial facility, but the biggest thing is they simply weren't familiar with it. And it makes sense right we have this beloved horse, in many cases, it has passed, and it's hard to, especially in those first few months after to think about what to do. So, the other thing that we found interesting is that people would be almost eight and a half times more likely to try composting if they knew there was research to stand behind it, and they would be almost two times more likely to try composting if they were just familiar with it. We're an extension in all of us here in extension, and that is part of our job to do research and then disseminate the results so I thought huh. I can do this I happened to meet one of the composting gurus Mark Hutchinson at a meeting in Maine, and he had a demonstration of horses being composted, and I thought you know this is something we can do and I think could be adopted in the horse industry. Before I move on to the actual composting process. I just want to make sure there aren't any questions. Alright, and Irene, I'm glad I'm glad that the composting has worked well for you. So, what we did with our research is we composted horses both in the spring and the fall I have to admit. I was a little hesitant to actually start in December which would be true Minnesota North Dakota winter. So I started it kind of took the easy way out I started the end of September. So it was really fall we composted horses both in the fall in the spring. And honestly our results are really similar so I'll just share the fall one with you. So we recruited four horses that were going to be euthanized anyways for terminal medical reasons most of them were advanced age and lameness. So they were euthanized the end of September. In Minnesota we have to compost on an impermeable pad. So we chose to just lay a concrete pad down in a rural agricultural area. And you can see these are the four individual mounds each one has a horse in. There's no fence, no cover. When composting is done right, there isn't smells or isn't scavengers being attracted. It was just out in an agricultural area. And again, I don't know Mary if you want to share does North Dakota have any regulations for an impermeable an impermeable pad when you're composting. So ours is more so just the soil type and so clay soils are preferred and best here. Yep. All right, great. So how we started it again this we I actually teach a horse management class so these are some of the students that were in that fall semester. They were helping with it. Mark Hutchinson is a gentleman in the gray shirt in the brown pants. And what we did is we made a playground we just use playground wood chips that you would see whatever playgrounds you would go to with your kids perhaps. And these to be about a foot and a half deep so 18 inches deep, and these pads look really big until you lay the horse on them so they were about 15 feet by about 15 feet. And the playground wood chips are really important you don't want to pack them down or step on them. You want them to be the carbon source because you also want them to be the air source so they want to be light and fluffy. So we are very careful not to step on them and kind of bring up those sides to measure 18 inches. Next we added three bags of pine shavings like you would use for a stall, simply because when the car when the carcass does start to decompose there is some liquid that that will come out of the carcass. And this just helps absorb the liquids we don't have any leachate coming from that pile. The next thing we did is for some biological activity we simply used beef feedlot pack it was from a local beef farm or they've been with corn stock fails, and then horse stall waste which was mostly apples and some shavings. We had our every two scoops of horse stall waste and this was just using a bobcat bucket or a skid loader bucket, we had one bucket full of beef feedlot manure and our, our collaborator mix that ahead of time. And we just took maybe half a bucket to sprinkle on top of that just so there was some of that biological activity because all the microbes are in that manure. Next we laid the horse down, and you can see that pile looks really big and tell the horse is on it. And because we want air flow, you really need about two feet all the way around the horse, including its legs. We have the wood chips, shavings, a little bit of manure and then the horse. And then we simply covered it with two feet of that same exact manure mixture that mixture of horse stall waste and cattle feedlot. And again, the biggest thing is to go two feet and try to leave some of that those playground wood chips exposed so air can get up and get through that pile. And here's what the, here's what the pile look like I mean this is what it looked like, you know, somebody that didn't know that it was an animal inside the pile would they wouldn't know they would think it was just a, you know, a pile of manure for example. So because this was a research project. It's really important to monitor the temperature of a compost pile. So we had these awesome little data loggers that connected right to my phone so I could get within maybe 50 feet of the pile and I could download the data. They were placed in that depth of 18 inches so kind of measure the outer temperature, and then one was placed at 36 inches right on the horse's body so we placed the, the temperature sensors, then we put the manure on top of the horses. People will really concerned that we'd have a lot of scavenging wildlife so we did install a trail camera, just to capture any activity that we could have in our temperature was recorded every eight hours for the full six months that we composted the horses. We didn't turn the piles at day 15 I'll share why, and then at the conclusion which was either six or seven months depending on the time of year. When we turn the piles and at the end we did sample the compost for sodium pentabarbital to look at that euthanasia solution throughout the process. We also scored the carcasses. There was a student that develop a carcass degradation score and it's listed here on a scale of one which is large amounts of flesh and hide and hair down to five which is none of that present and only a few large brittle bones. So this was this was the scale that we used. When we get into some of the results, temperature is incredibly important. So here, we have the, the average of our fall composting with all four piles average together we have temperature, and then we also have days after constructing or starting the compost. The little line is the 36 inch depth so that is on the core of the horse and that 18 that 18 inch depth is further out. Now in the state of Minnesota and Mary I love your input for a carcass to be considered fully composted. We have to have two heat cycles where the pile main reaches 130 degrees Fahrenheit and is maintained for seven to 10 days. And two of those heat cycles, the pile is considered composted. So Mary, what's it like in North Dakota. Okay, so we don't have any statutes like that, but we do when we're teaching follow very similar advice. And so we like the over 130 for seven to 10 days for all the reasons you are going to say. So, you can see that, you know, at that day zero when we constructed those piles, you can see immediately within two to three days those piles reached 160. It's really important we want the piles to be between 104 and 150 or 49 degrees. That is those thermophilic conditions where those microbes really react and really break down that carcass. And now our piles did get a little hot. But again, they recovered nicely and you can see why we turned the piles at day 50. You can see there's just that gradual decrease in temperature. And the temperature is created when those microbes are reproducing and kind of digesting the carcass. So, as they sort of run out me they don't have legs right they really can't they're not mobile. So, you know they need to be stirred and kind of redistribute redistribute the nutrients in that pile. So we could tell that we had already reached our 130 degrees we had sustained it but our temperature was slowly decreasing we knew we needed to turn the pile. So at day 50 we pulled it, we turned the piles and you can see almost instantly it went back up and sustained in that hundred that 104 to 149 degrees. So technically, according to the statute in the state of Minnesota our piles were fully composted within 10 weeks. And Krishna I'm going to pause you there for just a second and just say point out isn't it really interesting and so when you look at about day 15 close to 20, it naturally brought itself down, but then it spiked itself right back up. And so that can be any number of reasons maybe there was a little bit of a breeze that day. And so some more airflow got in maybe it rained a little bit and some moisture got in, or maybe our microbes kicked it in the butt and decided to go back to their job and do their thing. And so it's really neat to see we do see that increase again at 50 because we manually made that happen. But at the 20, 10 to 20 day there it naturally just spikes and goes down and spikes and goes down. Yeah. Yeah, that that's a great, you know, that's a great observation. You're absolutely true. I will say that at day seven with a carcass sort of collapsed. There was some cracking in the top of our pile and we did put one more skid load or Bobcat scoop of that manure mixture. Because remember that manure mixture is going to form a crust. And that is what is going to keep those volatile acids or those smells inside the pile, because it's the smells that attracts scavengers. So again, we did cap it when that carcass collapse and we anticipated that happening. Now we did leave our piles go for six to seven months simply because we know during that cooling phase or really that day 100 to day 210 or you know whatever that is. We still know that there is some brittling of the bones that is happening during that time and that was important for us to see happen. So when we look at the carcass gradation score. So here are individual piles. An individual saying adding animal to the pile. For example, you would put the body of the second horse kind of nestled in between the legs of the horse. But because this was a research, we treated these piles as a replicate. So we looked at them individually. So you can see the weights of the horses that were in each pile. The degradation scores on day 50 were twos and threes and the degradation scores at the end were threes and fours. Remember for is no higher hair present. The flesh was completely degraded and only the large bones remain. It is interesting that the smaller carcasses were more degraded than the bigger carcasses. So I'm going to show some pictures. The inside of one of the piles at day 50. Now, if any of you are like me, I always thought it'd be fun to be an archaeologist. And I was expecting to see like little horse bones kind of laid out. And when we opened the pile, there was nothing. This is the middle of the pile after 50 days in compost. Do any of you see anything. No, you can maybe see some little skin colored flesh towards the bottom left of that picture. But again, you know, there was a little bit of a smell when we opened up that pile because again that manure had formed a crust. But this was it. At the end of day 217. That's what we had it looked like a combination of manure that had more wood chips in it. And then our final product you can see is right here. Now, the largest bones were not completely brittle or gone after 217 days. But all that was left of the four horses is pictured in the right the larger bones remain the pelvis, the skull, the femur and some of the larger ribs. Now, if you were going to continue composting you could put those bones back into a larger pile. Or about you know back into an active pile. We simply chose to bury those few bones that remained. So what about the magic question what about the sodium pentobarbital. So, this is a huge issue is an issue that really only impacts the horse industry, because our other large animals and our other livestock into the food chain so it's never given sodium pentobarbital they are humanely slaughtered and into the food system in the US our horses don't have that fate. So here are the individual piles and here is the amount of sodium pentobarbital on day 50. You can see it ranges from 6.5 to 2.5. I'm really wondering what does this mean. Well, because this is a relatively new issue where we've had some restrictions on rendering at least in Minnesota. We do not have any recommendations for minimal amounts of sodium pentobarbital that is accepted in the industry. Again, it's an only a horse issue or primarily a horse issue. So we do not know if this is high, medium or low. However, we know in the literature that there's when you look at scavenging birds, farm dogs, things that have been secondarily poisoned accidentally by consuming an improperly you know, buried or disposed of carcass. We know that the lethal dose of sodium pentobarbital for a dog is 85 micrograms per gram, and you can see we are not even close. So, we don't think this is an issue, but there are no guidelines that we can use to confirm this. We also know that when land applied to an agricultural field, the soil microbes will continue to break down any sodium pentobarbital. And if we look at day 217, just because we can detect it doesn't mean it's a problem we can still detect it but in very, very small amounts. So based on working with our Board of Animal Health, our Department of Ag, and just our collective scientific minds on the project, we very confidently applied this land applied this to an agricultural field that was going into small grains, and we didn't have any issues. Yes, we can still detect the sodium pentobarbital, but no, we do not think it will cause an issue. So what about scavengers? So, you know, this is, these are images from our wildlife cam. Yes, we had crows and we saw maybe some evidence of some digging and we saw a fox or wolf or whatever that is. It's probably a wolfish thing. But you know, we did not have any piles that were disturbed. There weren't bones drug around there wasn't a lot of, you know, there just wasn't wildlife activity, mostly because our piles were properly formed. In that crust, there wasn't smells and you can see in the back of this color picture, there is a very large home, and I don't even know if they knew what was happening at this site. So again, we just didn't have issues with smells or flies or scavengers but again our piles were monitored and properly composted. So I wanted to leave time for lots and lots of questions. But one thing is that because this was a research grant, a large part of it was designated to really educating horse owners on the possibility that composting can be a viable option for carcass disposal. And quite honestly in many parts of Minnesota, for some people it's the only option, especially if you can't bury the horse has been euthanized the renderer won't take it, and if it's the middle of February right there's just, you just don't have a lot of options anymore in some parts of the country. This is especially true as you move towards the east coast. So we have a lot of resources currently available that are freely available. We have YouTube videos and how to construct and manage a compost pile. We have two more that talk about frequently asked questions and land applying it. We have infographics that are pictured here, which sort of outline how to build that pile so you can see in those, you know that playground wood chips the, the sawdust, or the, you know, the stall shavings, the manure the horse and then more manure and it gives dimensions that we recommend for that average thousand pound horse. Obviously if you have a pony it can be slightly smaller if you have a draft it's going to be bigger. We have website articles and also our scientific manuscript on this project was actually just accepted this week. We also do offer a fee based course in January. It's a six week certificate course that people can take it off to a certificate of course completion that walks you through this process more in depth and maybe covers some of the maybe potential issues that somebody could face. So, the take home message is we know that owners and veterinarians are open to composting because of our survey data, but they wanted scientific information to back the process, and they wanted educational resources and I hope that we've provided that to the best of our ability. We know that composting can be used as a primary disposable carcass disposal practice in the horse industry we know that it's commonly used in the swine industry and poultry industry, especially unfortunately as we have high path, going through both of our states and the US right now. We know that it's friendly for the environment we know that our state agencies support it. There are some still questions that remain about sodium pentobarbital. But again, just because you can detect something doesn't mean it's going to be a problem, but we have applied for a follow up research funding to further explore that option. And then of course our educational materials are freely available except for the online course which is a fee based course but everything else is freely available, mostly online. So, funding for this project was provided by our rapid egg response fund. And of course, we just want to thank everyone that helped carry it out. So, Mary with that, I'm going to stop sharing so that we have more time for questions. We can always go back I can show you images if we need to, but I do just, you know, I just want to make sure that we have plenty of time for questions and for you to add what you see in North Dakota. Yeah, thanks that was awesome first congratulations on the manuscript that is a feat. So that's awesome that it's going to be out there more in the research community as well now. Yep. And then second I just have to echo a couple of things you said and so the first one would be the base. I am realizing more and more, the longer I do this that that is one of the most important parts of composting. We tend to think that each step is the most important right because we work with it a lot but if you start with a really good base, you're going to have better success. And so just echoing everything Krishna said there. Something else that I picked up on and want to just reiterate is the smell. So people ask me a lot so we compost mostly a lot cattle at our center. However, it doesn't matter what kind of livestock we're composting people always ask like doesn't it stink. And I'm like, okay. If you open it up and you have a degrading carcass. You're going to smell something right, but most often and like you said, it's most often the manure the spoiled silage the oldest stillers the bulking material that we use that actually stinks more because the carcasses broke down. By the time we open it the carcasses broke down already to the point where that smell is no longer an issue. And so does it smell sure it's not a little bit if you get too close and step on it you'll stink a little. But does it stink like a carcass that has been abandoned out on a section line. No, not at all. There are just a couple thoughts. I think we're talking. And so we can have other people ask questions so you guys if you want to unmute turn on your cameras unmute you're more than welcome to this is meeting format and so we would welcome you to do that otherwise you can always type them into the chat or send them privately to Rachel or page or I and, and we can answer them. I have a question. We know that we stated the level of toxicity for pentavarvotel for dogs. Is it known for other scavengers I'm thinking wildlife like skunks raccoons box birds, smaller animals. Yeah so page that is a great question. I included that example for dog because that is what has been reported in the scientific literature. I am unsure if it's been reported for scavengers, but obviously it's probably on a per body weight type, you know, scale. I would assume it would be less simply because I think that was like for your average 40 pound dog, and I don't know what birds of prey or eagles way but probably 510 1520 pounds depending on the bird. So it would probably be less. But that's a great question and I don't know the exact answer but if any of you know, please share. One question I thought of well while you were talking about so when you turn that pile on, and you get it ready to be in its next heat cycle do you need to add more of that manure to the top to create that crust again. Yeah, oh Rachel that's a great question so we did not add more, but you do have to kind of put your, you know, strong girl pants on or whatever. So there's going to be bones and stuff that stick out, you have to take those and sort of tuck them into the pile. It doesn't bother me, but not everyone would have the stomach for that, especially if it was your own personal horse. So we did not have to add anything but we did have to tuck those larger bones into the middle of the pile, just so that they weren't sticking out to potentially attract a scavenger. But even at day 50, most of the meat that would be on the bone that would attract a scavenger had already been decomposed or already been composted off the bone. And in fact, in animal science and veterinary medicine teaching getting bones is a very expensive thing. And because the compost did so well. A lot of those bones that you see in the picture were actually saved for teaching purposes because they were so well composted there wasn't any hide or meat left on those bones and they could use them just for teaching. And that is something Krishona you had mentioned that you guys buried some of the bones or that's an option. Another option in North Dakota and several other states too and probably Minnesota as well as if they're white bones. And so they're clean they're dry all of the there's nothing left on them it's just the white bone by itself, you can put them in the dumpster. Yes, well, this was on a wonderful farmer collaborate. There's a lot of hay and he's like you know I just can't have clients, you know, opening up a bale of hay, and having you know a femur in there. But you know that is one thing I was sort of anticipating that those larger bones would be brittle after six or seven months and they weren't yet. I don't from people that I've talked to that takes about a year to get those larger bones brittle so if you ran it through a nurse spreader or slinger, or something it might kind of shatter them or you wouldn't see them, but they, they were not. They were clean, but they weren't brittle yet at that point. So the customer nurse haulers that I work with in North Dakota really prefer no bones, going through their spreaders, especially. So, like I said, most of the time, if we're composting a horse, or a horse has died, it's almost always older. They tend to be a little more brittle. If it's a cow or a bull, most of time, they would be a little bit younger maybe or feedlot calf. And so their bones are calcified but stronger than something that's a little bit older. And so they're almost like rocks, sometimes going through my guys spreaders. And so if we can sort them out, that's great. And oftentimes people will say, Well, I don't want to sort them out. I don't really want to spread this. And so for us, that's okay. And I think it's Christian had mentioned we just open it up. And you can put another mortality in there. Or you can start another pile and put those bones back in, just to give them another heat cycle. This was done during COVID. So my children who are in high school, they were recruited. And the one loved being the bone collector. So maybe the rest of you will look out and have somebody that enjoys finding the bones. And I think it's worth mentioning too that even, you know, if you don't want to go and tuck those bones back in to finish the compost pile, it would be an option to take some more manure or that nitrogen source and kind of build on top of that pile. Sometimes that's easier for people to do if they have access to that material. Is there any thoughts or concerns? For sure, it doesn't all have to be positive, right? If there's a concern in the group, we're happy to try to address that too. Or if anyone is thinking that you might want to try this in the future, you're more than welcome to comment. This is Irene. And when we did the composting, it was kind of, it was a family chores, been in the family for 36 years. And they did not want it rendered. They wanted to keep it forever. So what we did was we did the, just pretty much what you said, except that we didn't get enough on the bottom days. We didn't make big enough. And thank goodness it was a smaller printer. But we had leakage around the outside. So then we took the, this was kind of a covert matter. We didn't tell anybody what we were doing, but they were avid gardeners. And so we sort of like had two compost piles going, their gardening compost pile and the beloved friend. And, but we took the more of the pine and recovered the bottom, like the bottom two feet we put to absorb the moisture. And then they did, they were avid, apology people. And they did want, they did want the skull. So we went in twice to find it the first time it still wasn't ready. So we went in the second time and found it. And in that process we turned it. Now, I don't know if turning it fully would have done better. And it really wasn't an issue because in the end it was their flower bed. And it really, it really was emotionally fulfilling for the family to have this beautiful flower bed. And I was wondering, in retrospect, if making it into the flower bed would cause it to decompose more thoroughly over time. And I'll let you go with that. Yeah, you know, Irene, I think that's a beautiful story, right? We hear people say that they like composting because they feel like they can keep control of that horse throughout that process. And I think making it into a flower bed is a wonderful idea. And of course, the longer that pile is managed. And if you have things growing, it's going to continue to decompose those bones and make them eventually brittle and they'll just go away. You know, I think to truly manage it, you'd have to turn it. And I don't know how much tillage is done in that flower bed, even if it's just hand-wise. If you're planting annuals, maybe, but perennials, you're probably not disturbing it as much. But it's definitely a great way to honor the horse and to have a, you know, a friendly way to manage that carcass. I know Irene mentioned some issues with that kind of bottom layer, not having enough. And I saw that you had both the wood chips and the corn stover. Oh, oh, yeah. Corn stover is an option on there. Would the corn stover or those corn stalks and hay work or what other options are there? Those are kind of the best ones. Yeah, Rachel, that's a great question. So that is the second research project that we are trying to get. We know that in a rural area, wood chips or, you know, playground wood chips are sort of inexpensive and hard to come by commodity. So we do believe that corn stover or corn stalks will work just as well. They have been used in other species, but not horses. So we have no reason to know that they won't work. But of course, we like to test it in the specific species. We are concerned that things like hay are like older hay or kind of maybe not great quality hay, rained on hay or straw. But because it compacts so much, there won't be enough airflow and that it won't work as well, or at least that's what's been deserved in other species. So it needs to be kind of light and fluffy. So the corn, the corn stalk veils, the corn stover, or the wood, the playground wood chips are probably your best bet. And we would probably shy away from things like yard clippings and, you know, leaves that you pick up in the fall and old hay and straw, mostly because it's going to compact. But again, that is exactly what we're looking at in our next research project that we, we haven't started that yet. But that's exactly what we're looking at for the exact reasons that you just mentioned. We're not really sure what will happen. We think we know, but I've been doing research long enough where I no longer think anything because I'm usually wrong. Chris, it looks like there's a question in the chat, would cedar wood chips work, or would they contain a chemical which would suppress composting. So that is a great question that I don't know the answer of but let's just think out loud for a second. So, I don't think the type of wood chips matter. I would not want wood chips that are treated with anything in case that would lead, you know, to killing off those microbes in some weird things. So for example, you know, like around my landscaping at my house I have those wood chips that have been sprayed red, right, like I probably wouldn't want to use those number one they're even more expensive. And I don't know how that spray would interact with the microbes. So I don't think the type of wood that you're chipping matters. But I wouldn't want anything added in. But Mary, maybe you know more about that question. No, I don't have anything specific either but I would agree. So we consider this a natural process right and so the more quote unquote natural we can be with it, I think the better results will get and so I think sticking with something that like you said is not treated, and also, ultimately, we don't know what we're going to end up doing with it all the time. So sometimes we go to flower beds, sometimes we plant trees, sometimes it says there and sometimes we spread it. And because of that, because we're not sure exactly what we're doing, sticking away from stuff that may have some kind of some kind of chemical contamination is probably best. And I know sometimes are if we're using straw, if we're using corn stock sometimes that stuff hasn't sprayed as well. And so there we're more concerned about a residual from that spray, maybe hurting our plants that would grow. So that's a whole other line to think about and we, we do have some information about that as far as chemical residual and how long that stuff lasts. Yeah, so, and I know Mary you guys have a lot of great resources I just shared our one that is specific to this process in the chat. And I was actually trained as a weed scientist so that herbicide, I know that herbicide residue question is a really great one and one you really need to consider. If you're using hay or straw, especially if your end product is a nursery or a garden, or even a soybean field for example, you know you just have to watch anything that would be a broad leaf and just kind of know what those stocks were sprayed with. And yes that's a great resource that Krishna shared. And so I will email that out when I email the recording out. And of course if you guys have any follow up questions from this you're more than welcome to send them to page Rachel and myself. We can always get those questions to Krishna if we can't answer them for you. And so we're happy to continue the conversation. If you have something that comes up later.