We have 1 mini Hereford on an acre that is downhill from our well. During the rainy months, I am worried that the rain will dissolve the cow manure and affect our water. Is that accurate? Or is that only a concern if we have many cattle?
I am planning to pick up as much manure as possible for dry storage, but I am just concerned about the amount of rain we get dissolving a lot of it. We have about 2 acres of pasture, the cow is contained to 1 acre of it. It all has very healthy, growing vegetation.
One cow can certainly impact the groundwater—but less likely since it will move around and spread its manure naturally.
Grazing during the rainy season
Despite the low chance that a single animal will contaminate your well water, we always recommend that all livestock are not on a pasture during the rainy season as they cause soil compaction and damage the grass root system, and pasture in the winter months can have significantly less nutritional value. A sacrifice area is ideal.
Manure management
Unless you have a much higher stocking rate, the nitrogen from the manure is being reused by the plant roots for growth (during the growing season). If you are planning to gather and compost manure, just keep the pile or area covered during the rainy season to stop the leeching of excess nitrate and coliform bacteria into the soil profile and moving downward
into the groundwater.
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