I’ve been waiting for the right time to write this blog. As they say, timing is everything. And now, the time is right to unveil a massive partnership.
Like all unveilings, this one is a big one in the soil world. It’s like Tom Brady coming out of retirement again, or Elon Musk buying Twitter, or the U.K. leaving the E.U! Well, It’s not exactly that big, but in our world, the world of beneficial microbes and organic matter… this is big.
Malibu Compost is excited to introduce our soil partnership that we entered into back in 2021, just after Covid took over everyone’s lives. Early that spring a friend of mine called me with what he said might be an interesting opportunity. He is a customer of Malibu Compost and owns a large demolition and recycling company in Southern California.
He was working on a huge project that involved transitioning century old dairies into tilt-up warehouses for some giant global corporations. He said that the dairies had amazing pastures and stock piles of aged manure. He told me that the plan was to remove the manure and topsoil by trucking it off to dumpsites which he felt was expensive and a waste of great organic material. He asked me what I thought and if we could use the material for Malibu Compost?
I told him that the material wouldn’t work for us because this was aged material and Malibu Compost uses organic dairy cow manure right off of the separator before composting. I also told him that he was right and it seemed a shame to throw away a century of dairy farming that was built on the backs of farmers, families, cows, water, land and microbes since the early 1900’s. I told him that I’d come out and run some soil tests and other tests to see what the material looked like.
A few weeks later, all of the tests came back clean.
The material, organic matter, that was days old to 100 years old would have to be moved, formed into windrows, and watered in such a way that we could regenerate the biological energy of the microbes.
We decided it was time to meet the soil engineers who were working with the developer on the project, one of the largest developers in the world. If we could figure out a plan that made sense for everyone, then maybe we could reclaim the dairy cow manure and topsoil from the site and get it into the hands of gardeners all across the country.
That meeting was a success! The developer agreed to let us set up a farm for us to compost on. The soil engineering firm, the demolition and recycling contractor and Malibu Compost formed a new soil company- Number 2 Organics.
We were given a 7 acre parcel to farm the compost and topsoil on. This meant creating huge stockpiles of beautiful farm made, aged, dairy cow manure and premium organic topsoil. It was excellent raw material that we stacked high in very large windrows and watered with the well water from the farm to activate the biology.
The cows were still out in pasture on the site when we got there. This made me really happy to see. They were intrigued by all of the work that we were doing. Over time they were being transported to their new homes in dairies up in Bakersfield and Northern California. The last cow left the farm 6 months into our new soil partnership. It was a sad day to see them go, but a great day to know that we saved 100 years of farming and the wonderful microbial diversity and organic matter from that land that was going to go to waste.
Malibu Compost thought long and hard about this soil partnership. I waited this long to properly introduce this soil partnership to you, because it took some time during and after Covid to get the marketing and product placement moving. We love this company and what it stands for.
We are making incredible compost on our farm site and our soil partnership has a topsoil that is unlike any topsoil that I have ever seen in all my years of landscaping, gardening and farming. It has 11-17% organic matter in it which is aged dairy cow manure from cows roaming the site for a century. It is the perfect seed cover and a topsoil that you can actually grow in!
There is a high demand for large amounts of good soil now, much more than ever before, and we are making this available to you through Number 2 Organics in bulk, bags and totes.
If you are looking for a good organic compost, topsoil or potting soil that is better than all the rest, except for the best, and we know who that is… then look no further than Number 2 Organics.
SPECIAL OFFER:
If you want to try Number 2 Organics soil products, go online to the website. For any 6 quart of compost, topsoil or potting soil that you purchase on the website, we’ll send you a free Number 2 Organics T-shirt on us. This goes for all of you that buy a bag of any Number 2 product at any retailer that carries us. Send us a copy of your receipt, your address and shirt size and we’ll send you a free T-shirt as well. We want to see all of you gardeners out there gardening in your Number 2 t-shirts this spring to celebrate this new soil partnership!
© Randy Ritchie 2023