Massive hog feedlot proposed in Fillmore County

Catalpa LLC proposes to build the largest hog confinement operation in FIllmore County to house 4,980 sows. The partnership includes an Iowa agribusiness and a Newburg Township farmer.

Because an adult swine produces ten times as much fecal waste as a human, this single operation would produce more waste than twice the entire 20,000 population of Fillmore County—like adding a new city of 50,000 people, according to Dr. Mark Sobsey, University of North Carolina.

Since this would be a farrowing operation that produces piglets, one has to ask, where would the finishing barns to feed the piglets be located? Is this the first phase of connected developments yet to come?

The proposer is Brad Herman, an owner of Waukon Feed Ranch in Waukon, Iowa. Their feed mill sells feed for 120,000 pigs and they also manage over 24,000 sows in three states, according to their website.

Citizens may make written comments to the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency on the Catalpa LLC Environmental Assessment Worksheet (EAW) by May 30, 2018, and can request that a fuller Environmental Impact Statement be conducted.

The Catalpa operation would store nearly nine million gallons of manure in cement pits under two barns, holding a year’s worth of manure. The manure would be pumped out in spring and fall and applied to at least 732 cropland acres within 4.5 miles of the site, according to the proposal.

Placing such an enormous amount of nutrient-laden liquid waste in a karst area poses severe threats to water quality. While soil tests and carefully calibrated manure applications are supposed to prevent pollution, all bets are off in a karst area.

While two sinkholes were identified in the EAW, renowned karst expert Calvin Alexander has already identified three more sinkholes and eleven potential sinkholes in LiDAR images, which should be field checked, he told me.

Manure application may ultimately cause the biggest long-term impact of this project, as creeks, trout streams and sinkhole conduits to groundwater will receive all manure that is not taken up quickly by crops. Average depth to groundwater on manure application fields is 6 feet, and some are as shallow as 1.5 feet, noted in the proposal.

Manure would be applied by direct injection or broadcasting followed within a day by incorporation into the soil. The company hopes for a ten day window of manure application each season, but of course experience shows that late harvests, rain, snow and frozen ground will foil those plans. If the pit is full, the manure has to go somewhere even if conditions are terrible. Fields with no growing crops are susceptible to runoff and infiltration of excess nutrients.

Heavy water withdrawal by the facility poses a threat to three private wells and three creeks, as well as a rare plant species, according to DNR, which will consider a well permit for over a million gallons a year, according to the environmental assessment.

The stink of hog feedlots has devastated neighboring farmers and non-farm landowners all across the country, even to the point of being unable to sell their houses. Catalpa plans to use prevailing winds to ventilate their barns, so odors and dangerous gasses will affect the area.

The Catalpa EAW with maps is available on line (search for Catalpa EAW) Comments must be emailed by May 30 to charles.peterson@state.mn.us, or mailed to Charles Peterson, MPCA, 520 Lafayette Road North, St. Paul, Minn. 55155. The MPCA Commissioner will decide if this EAW is sufficient to grant permits, or will require a full Environmental Impact Statement.