planteny, there might be someone who lives close to you that has cow manure or maybe there is a horse stable near you. but you need to say what area you live so that people will know if they are close or not. lol.

If it is 'mostly powdery' it may become hot with the addition of water. It may also be mostly saw dust or other bedding material and the clumps you are finding are the manure. As long as you have finished harvesting, you can use it as mulch on your asparagus bed. I mulch my asparagus beds every fall, after I cut them back, with composted horse bedding. Of course, I know that my neighbors, who supply me with the bedding, don't use vast amounts of drugs on their horses. I wouldn't want some of the residual drugs in my garden compost.

Such a debated topic. Non aged/composted manure that gets spread directly on the ground tends to leach nutrients (leading to pollution etc) and thus needs to be tilled (there is a whole other debate) in or mixed with carbon material to bind the nitrogen. Then there is potential for disease pathogens if there is not enough time between application and harvest (I've seen a gov regulation that said something like 120 days.) Aged manure just means that any leaching or escaping of nutrients has already happened (or if you are making a pile of just manure to let it sit for a year, you will be doing that aging/leaching polluting right there.) Yea the aged manure would still be good for the compost pile or the garden but you have let some of the good stuff escape by letting it age. However if you are simply letting it age to deal with pathogens you probably should make sure you age it for that year before using on any fast crops. By far the best option would be to put relatively fresh manure into the compost mixed with an appropriate amount of carbon material. (Ok when I say fresh, you don't need to be catching it steaming out of the end of the cow, you can wait till it is firm enough to collect.) Do keep in mind, if you are adding manure to your compost, you should allow a good amount of time to pass before using that compost on your garden. As in, a compost pile that had fresh manure added to it last month should not be used on your lettuce garden this month. The exact amounts of time vary from person to person, by different types of manure and crop and by composting ability. Humanure compost piles are usually allowed to age for a full year after the last addition to the pile before being used. For cow manure, perhaps 6 months is appropriate. :) Oh, and as to when you should collect it, whenever you can. When it's old or fresh doesn't matter that much, if you have fresh in the pile, then treat it all as fresh especially since you may not be able to tell how many months a pie has aged in the field. Perhaps the old stuff isn't as good as the new but it is all still better than nothing! Here is a link that might be useful: My bins

I think your friend with the good results using cow dung was just BS-ing you. Cow poop, cattle dung, cow chips, steer manure, bull s**t or bovine feces by any other name is a poor fertilizer for a lawn. But if you have a thing for using number 2 on your grass then...Get some Milorganite which is processed human poop from Milwaukee, WI to put on your lawn. But if you want to get your hands on some patties. Cow chips (the old dry stuff) can be tossed in competition every April in Beaver, OK. (I'm not making this up) So if you have yen to handle some ...check out the link below. Just be sure to watch where you step. Here is a link that might be useful: Cow Chip Throwing Contest