In a state with 72, miles of streams and or so lakes and reservoirs, Bloody Run is one of only 34 water bodies we can call outstanding. In the last 10 years, DNR has stocked more than , trout in Bloody Run 1 , and brown trout are naturally reproducing in the stream. Yes, a reasonable person could expect that. Cattle are big eating machines, and as such they produce a lot of waste, about 14 times as much as a human being when considering the nutrient and solids content of that waste.
Even under the most ideal circumstances and weather conditions, it would be a colossal challenge to reconcile this operation with maintaining Bloody Run in its present condition.
In the case of Walz Energy, the original intention was to anaerobically digest the manure and then capture and sell the natural gas generated by the process.
But Walz made a pledge to the Jumbo Shrimp Commission in July to fix the problems 4 , and the commission declined to let the Attorney General take over. Sorry for being such a oxy moron. As it turns out, there were two parties in this deal. One side of beef was comprised of some energy guys and on the other side were some cattle guys, the Walzes. Maybe they had some negative income no more oxymorons, I promise. With cattlemen being what they are, however, they would still like to raise some cattle in the feedlots and accompanying six barns that have been built, and that brings us to the here and now.
Without a digester, that manure has to go somewhere and that somewhere is crop ground. Remember that the Bloody Run watershed is less than half the size of the city of Des Moines. To get rid of the manure, they will apply lbs of N per acre of corn grown in consecutive years to land that they say will produce bushels per acre of grain.
