Urine and leaves bad combination?

During the last year I have started using diluted urine in the garden and on compost piles. I have several piles of compost. One of them is primarily leaves. I occasionally take leaves from this pile and add to the others if needed, but any excess leaves always go on this pile. Anyway, a friend was over at the house the other day and I mentioned using urine. He said that was good but to not us it on the leaves only pile. He didn't know the reason but said that he read or heard it somewhere that urine and leaves were a bad combination. Is that good advice or bad info?

I don't think it really matters. Urine is a concentrated source of nitrogen and has some phosphorus, potassium, etc., and using it on leaves should just make them decompose quicker and enrich the resulting compost's nitrogen content.

I've been using a "sawdust urinal" for nearly a year now, throwing the stuff into my regular compost heap.  It's great stuff!  Fill a 5 gallon bucket with sawdust or small wood chip or other loose organic material, relieve yourself as needed, and keep covered with a lid.  Empty when full.

The only problem would be from adding too much urine at one time.  If the pile smells like piss, add more leaves, or some dirt (soil), or finished compost, and mix well.

Check out Joe Jenkins "The Humanure Handbook" and website for more information on composting human "waste".

http://www.humanurehandbook.com/manual.html

If you read the ingredient list on most commercial fertilizers you will see that most of the Nitrogen comes from a variety of ureas.  Applying urine to living plants will usually kill them (plus add too many salts to the soil).  Adding it to compost will both speed up the process and provide a more nutritional end product.

Sometimes I do water my compost pile with a urine/water mixture in a ratio of 1:10. That whay you can also water plants directly. But not often. It is still a very potent nitrogen source.

Before I started using the Jenkins sawdust toilet I used rabbit urine directly on plants.  I would dilute it by at least 50%. largely to extend it.  In winter with most plants dorment I use it on compost to make a hot pile.  I have yet to incorperate a urine diverter in my bucket system, and straining is a pain so do not use human urine that way, yet.  When working the garden I do not hesitate to pee on root plants or the base of  taller edible plants.  Never had a problem with burning or anything compared to other less urinated plants, only posative results.

My guess would be the urine being a nitrogen source and the leaves being a nitrogen source. The carbon/nitrogen ratio is way off, if composting, and would lead to some strong foul smells.

Jeremy Hillman wrote:My guess would be the urine being a nitrogen source and the leaves being a nitrogen source. The carbon/nitrogen ratio is way off, if composting, and would lead to some strong foul smells.

I treat my leaves as a carbon source rather than a nitrogen source, assuming dead leaves.

They might be meaning green leaves, maybe?
On the other hand, there is this little problem when I use only two types of materials (one of them being fall- brown leaves) for compost. Sometimes when I am in a hurry I mix brown leaves with coffee grounds. Even though the ratios are correct, it is not ideal (btw it is definetly not a good way of making compost, I think it should be as diverse as possible - there are many good ideas in permies.com like adding vitamin minaral supplements -Redhawk). The leaves stick with each other, and it needs at least 2 more turns then my regular piles. The additional turns are required to make the pile more uniform. Initially the pile gets into a laminated body, such as like leaf- "wet" coffee- leaf and on, forming blocks. It is as if coffee is acting like cement, a very weak one though, but enoıgh to stop oxygen through. So, I think, what is behind this idea is not urine- not urine but general problem about fall leaves. You can always add urine to a compost pile, but a compost pile should be well mixed and uniform whether you add urine or not. Full size fall leaves, as used as the main carbon material, make it hard to achive.
Leaf mold is something perfect btw.

s. ayalp wrote: Initially the pile gets into a laminated body, such as like leaf- "wet" coffee- leaf and on, forming blocks. It is as if coffee is acting like cement, a very weak one though, but enoıgh to stop oxygen through. So, I think, what is behind this idea is not urine- not urine but general problem about fall leaves. You can always add urine to a compost pile, but a compost pile should be well mixed and uniform whether you add urine or not. Full size fall leaves, as used as the main carbon material, make it hard to achive.
Leaf mold is something perfect btw.

In my experience, it is the leaves themselves that mat together.  Leaves will do that without the coffee grounds.  I always shred my leaves now, and they don't stick together then.

I generally do not recommend using urine unless you are truly a wholesome person.

Think about medications and such and if you take those, you are peeing them out.  Thus I generally do not advise using human urine or animals who are treated with medications.

urin is great fertalizer but a little acidic. i use urin as a foliar,two liters aged urin16 liters water, two tablespoons wood ash. Without the ashes can become too much

Is there a way to lookup medicines and see how they're motabilized and if there are any concerns with the motabalities?

I do not know a study in personal urine dispensing with it but I do believe it pollutes water ways.

Take this for what you will as they are articles and not stated full studies.

drugs in water

urine and wildlife article.

In part, getting an understanding how the digestive and urine systems works will help you.

Pee away!

Pee with leaves is fantastic.  Pee with anything is fantastic.

I regularly pee directly around the base of N loving plants like tomatoes, okra, and corn.  I pee directly around the root zone of my trees.  I pee on the compost pile and have even been known to pee in the potting mix bin (although that is rare).  I pee in the watering pot and then fill it up with 2 gal. of water.  I pee on old tree stumps.  Oh the adolescent wonders of being a guy with a pee distribution nozzle.

I've never seen any evidence of salt damage or any other concern.




My, those fruit trees grew well this year, and the almond tree grew by almost 5 feet.  Wonder why?

Marco Banks wrote:Pee away!

Pee with leaves is fantastic.  Pee with anything is fantastic.

I regularly pee directly around the base of N loving plants like tomatoes, okra, and corn.  I pee directly around the root zone of my trees.  I pee on the compost pile and have even been known to pee in the potting mix bin (although that is rare).  I pee in the watering pot and then fill it up with 2 gal. of water.  I pee on old tree stumps.  Oh the adolescent wonders of being a guy with a pee distribution nozzle.

I've never seen any evidence of salt damage or any other concern.




My, those fruit trees grew well this year, and the almond tree grew by almost 5 feet.  Wonder why?

I do the same.  Comfrey in particular gets peed on.  I've never burned a plant or seen any adverse effect.  I have seen plants that were obviously not getting enough nitrogen turn a beautiful dark green and take off.

Jeremy Hillman wrote:Is there a way to lookup medicines and see how they're motabilized and if there are any concerns with the motabalities?

The PDR (physicians desk reference) is updated yearly with everything about every drug on the market, including metabolism details.

I do like to use urine to fertilize, unfortunately my equipment doesn't make it as easy as men.

My blackberries seem to be currently experiencing excess nitrogen, because my dogs always pee on them. The only thing I could think of to help is to water, thereby diluting it. Does anyone else have any other ideas?

I will say that some plants don't like being directly peed on. Foxgloves will fall over and die within an hour of my dog's peeing on it. So now, I just plant them where the dogs can't reach them.

Stacy Witscher wrote:I do like to use urine to fertilize, unfortunately my equipment doesn't make it as easy as men.

My blackberries seem to be currently experiencing excess nitrogen, because my dogs always pee on them. The only thing I could think of to help is to water, thereby diluting it. Does anyone else have any other ideas?

I will say that some plants don't like being directly peed on. Foxgloves will fall over and die within an hour of my dog's peeing on it. So now, I just plant them where the dogs can't reach them.

Maybe put woodchips around the blackberries to try to hold some of the nitrogen and slow the release to the plants?

Stacy Witscher wrote:I do like to use urine to fertilize, unfortunately my equipment doesn't make it as easy as men.

My blackberries seem to be currently experiencing excess nitrogen, because my dogs always pee on them. The only thing I could think of to help is to water, thereby diluting it. Does anyone else have any other ideas?

I will say that some plants don't like being directly peed on. Foxgloves will fall over and die within an hour of my dog's peeing on it. So now, I just plant them where the dogs can't reach them.

Have the dogs pee in another spot.  I used to have a large yard and I was fine with people walking their dog and I would tell the old people they need not pick up the dog poops, especially in the winter/cold periods but to please to do not let them pee in the same place as it makes dead spots.  After that kind of talking with people, always positive I had no more issues with that.