WATER-QUALITY BENEFITS OF HAVING CATTLE MANURE DEPOSITED AWAY FROM STREAMS

A series of runoff and infiltration studies with bovine feces placed 0 .0, 0.61, 1.37, or 2.13 m from a collection point were used to assess effectiveness of vegetative filter strips. Effectiveness was evaluated on the ability of the separation distance to reduce the number of fec al coliform (FC) bacteria being transported from the manure to the edg e of the plots. Bacterial transport was evaluated under conditions of variable distance, soil permeability, and rainfall intensity. The FC b acteria yields were 40-115 million at the edge of the manure pile. Thi s is only 17% of the FC in the manure. FC concentrations and yields we re further reduced as the separation increased. The analysis of data d id not indicate significant differences of bacteria transport in relat ion to rainfall intensities of 5 cm/h versus 10 cm/h at the 0.61, 1.37 , or 2.13 m distances.