Selling Rabbit Manure

[lyndseyrk]

I'm thinking about selling my rabbit manure. I don't use it myself (don't have much of a green thumb). Two questions:

How would one "package" it? Bags? 5 gallon buckets?

What do you charge?

I know there many getting ready for garden season, and I think now would be a good time to get things situated, beforehand.

 

[MeadowView]

I use old feed bags. I also advertise it as what you get is what you get, and that is sometimes a mixture of bunny poop, bermuda grass, and alfalfa pellets. I've never gotten much for it, but gardeners love the stuff

 

[DevonW]

Old feed bags work, also the big brown paper bags for yard waste

 

[AprilW]

Feed bags. Be sure to check the market for your area. No one is selling their rabbit manure here, just giving it away free.

 

[lyndseyrk]

If I wanted to attempt to sell it, say a feed sack full, what should I charge starting out? How would I check the market for it, if I see no one else doing this?

 

[currycomb]

put up a sign where they sell plants and seeds. ask a couple dollars a bag, you provide the bags, they fill, or you can fill them if you don't want a bunch of folks trapessing around your place,m see what happens

 

[DevonW]

It depends on what your market is like. Here I can get $10.00 for a bag.

 

[Anntann]

You might want to do some marketing....Gather information that you can reprint on an advertisement. The fact that rabbit berries can go directly onto/into the garden. Won't burn the plants. Nutrient rich. Breaks down quickly into soil when moist. Natural fertilizer...etc. no pesticides or chemicals...yadda yadda. There are most likely articles and research papers out there on the net...or look on a garden network.

Anyway, tack up a flyer at the farm store? any bulletin boards around town. Do you have a small garden center or someone who has a greenhouse that sells to the public? maybe offer then 10%-20% of sales if you can put a dozen bags for sale there. They sell for $2.00 each, the gardener does no work, but gets 40cents a bag, you get $1.60. Something to look into.

 

[MaggieJ]

Don't underprice your bunny berries!

They are premium manure and should certainly bring as much as the bags of cow and sheep manure that garden centres sell.

 

[AprilW]

I checked my local Craigslist under the Farm & Garden section. I just did a search for "rabbit manure", at least five different advertisements came up - all giving it away. I decided it is more valuable to me in my own garden than trying to make money in a market that just doesn't exist here.

I do know of a breeder further south of me, near a major city who gets $8 per 50lb feed sack full of manure. Near the city, "fresh natural fertilizer" isn't so available and so he can market it how he chooses.

 

[ladysown]

it could be as well that no one has thought to try to sell it in your area. But my philosophy is that if I can use it, I'll use it. I only sell or give away what I can't use myself.

 

[lyndseyrk]

Well, I'm not using it. Not much of a green thumb. Figure I'll try it out, or else I'll never know!

 

[Anntann]

wow...I just looked for simple "manure" on craiglook. I have to go 100miles before I even find HORSE manure. (it's free, but jeeeez).

There is one guy who says he wants large quantities of manure (any animal) for composting. "drop it off at my farm". yah. right. I'll just drive my tractor over with the manure spreader, shall I? and GIVE you my black gold....

 

[avdpas77]

I think you might get a decent price if you take it to a "farmer's market" especially if you are around a university or "professional" community. Unlike most of us homesteaders, they tend to be willing to pay a price for something they want whether it is economical or not. It may take a couple of Saturdays to get things going, but the people that like it and can afford it will be back after more, and you may be able to retain them as regular customers and forgo the farmers market thing. Like Maggie says, they will snap up "composted" (not very) horse and cow manure by the bag, and rabbit manure is better. If you can separate the pellets from most of the hay and straw, you should get premium prices.

Don't worry that some people will come by and say "I can get all I want of that at my neighbor's barn"......good for them.... their will be plenty of people that can't.

 

[Devon's Mom Lauren]

We have a big "pit" that we put our manure in. It didn't start out as a pit but each time I clean it out it gets deeper! Anyways we collect it in there for a while and it basically starts composting. In fact it gets real hot sometimes. So its partially composted by the time I put it in the gardens.We don't separate anything hair; hay; poop; shavings. It all gets tossed together and mixed up. By then it looks more like "compost", which is a word that gets the gardeners' attention and something that they are more willing to fork over the big bucks for.Add in the words natural non processed etc. and you most likely should get more money for your product. Also the cheapest way to sell would to get people to bring their own containers. here we have recycling boxes for garbage day the we call "Blue Boxes" These boxes are used for stuff like that as well as recyclables at the curbside!

 

[rabbitgeek]

I first read about this on a rabbit forum somewhere.

Take some 5 gallon plastic buckets with lids. Put a small plastic trash bag in the bucket.
Put poop in the bucket up about 3/4 full. Close off the top of the bag with a wire twist
or by tying it off. Put the lid on the bucket. Now you can stack your buckets to save space
when you load the truck for the farmers market or garden show or where ever.

Try not to put wet poop in the bucket. Wet poop will be heavy to handle and develops smells faster.

When you get to your farmers market, you sell manure for $1 or $2 per bag, you keep the bucket.
You can't call it organic, but you can call it unprocessed manure since you don't screen it or
otherwise change it. If anyone asks, yes it might contain some seeds from hay if you feed hay.

After you sell the bag, you can stack the buckets one inside the other to save space on the way home.

Be sure to use good quality plastic bags. I often use plastic bags in buckets to make handling easier.

Have a good day!
Franco Rios

 

[Boo Boo's Mama]

rabbitgeek

Thanks for the suggestion, I have lots of buckets and my husband works in a community of 100k or so that has a university...that is where I sell my eggs.

 

[Jessykah]

do you have to separate the urine from the berries? Does the urine burn plants? Because that would change the way I have to set up my new rabbit cages.

 

[Anntann]

With my own plants, I've found that the urine helps. It's HIGH in nitrogen, and by the time you get it into a bag, and out to the plants, it's been absorbed by the berries.

 

[Cattle Cait]

Would you still be able to use pine shavings in your trays? Or is it more desireable not to use anything in the trays and just to sell the berries and whatnot?