Here at the Hooved Animal Humane Society, we recognize that animal health includes more than the animals themselves, but the environment in which they reside. Clean water and healthy, plentiful forage are vital aspects to maintaining animal health. By engaging in sustainable agricultural practices, we can ensure the health of all the animals that call our organization home.
What are sustainable practices?
In essence, sustainable practices make the resources you have work for you, not against you. We want to ensure good stewardship of the land and resources we have available to us, to ensure another fifty years of operation. By looking at things that are generally looked at as a negative (manure, insects, food waste) through the lens of sustainability, we can begin to make those things vital resources that allow us to give back to the environment we all share.
What kind of sustainable practices do you use?
Compost & Manure Management-
It’s no secret that horses poop, a LOT. So, what do you do with all that manure? Due to our sheer amount, we’ve devised a few different ways to use it to benefit our farm and the surrounding community. We are in the process of setting up a composting operation, which we will use to provide nutrients to our gardens and flower beds. In addition, we hope to sell it to local community members for use in their own personal gardens and other landscaping projects. Excess matter is sentto a recycling facility to be processed for nutrient-rich fertilizer or compost.
A Passion for Pollinators-
Pollinators are one of the most vital aspects of any ecosystem, and here at HAHS we are no exception. To keep our flowers, grasses, and other forage plants happy and healthy, they require the work of pollinators. By setting up designated pollinator zones full of native flowers and grasses throughout our farm, we give them a place to live and work, allowing them to help keep the rest of our farm plants and soil happy, increasing the quality of forage for our residents.
Conservation & Restoration Efforts-
Despite being known as the “prairie state”, Illinois has been losing her acres of beautiful prairie grasses and wildflowers due to urban sprawl and monocrop agriculture. Without these native grasses and wildflowers, our animals lose out on vital forage opportunities, which leads to a more simplified diet. Much like people, animals need different nutrients and vitamins in their diet to maintain good health, which they get from various plants. By making strides to reintroduce native grasses and flowers to our pastures, we keep these dwindling species alive and provide a wider variety of forage for our animal (and pollinator!) friends to snack on.
