Organic Gardener's Composting by Steve Solomon

_Fish and shellfish waste._ These proteinaceous, high-nitrogen and trace-mineral-rich materials are readily available at little or no cost in pickup load lots from canneries and sea food processors. However, in compost piles, large quantities of these materials readily putrefy, make the pile go anaerobic, emit horrid odors, and worse, attract vermin and flies. To avoid these problems, fresh seafood wastes must be immediately mixed with large quantities of dry, high C/N material. There probably are only a few homestead composters able to utilize a ton or two of wet fish waste at one time.

Oregonians pride themselves for being tolerant, slow-to-take-offense neighbors. Along the Oregon coast, small-scale market gardeners will thinly spread shrimp or crab waste atop a field and promptly till it in. Once incorporated in the soil, the odor rapidly dissipates. In less than one week.

_Fish meal_ is a much better alternative for use around the home. Of course, you have to have no concern for cost and have your mind fixed only on using the finest possible materials to produce the nutritionally finest food when electing to substitute fish meal for animal manures or oil cakes. Fish meal is much more potent than cottonseed meal. Its typical nutrient analysis runs 9-6-4. However, figured per pound of nutrients they contain, seed meals are a much less expensive way to buy NPK. Fish meal is also mildly odoriferous. The smell is nothing like wet seafood waste, but it can attract cats, dogs, and vermin.

What may make fish meal worth the trouble and expense is that sea water is the ultimate depository of all water-soluble nutrients that were once in the soil. Animals and plants living in the sea enjoy complete, balanced nutrition. Weston Price's classic book, _Nutrition and Physical Degeneration,_ attributes nearly perfect health to humans who made seafoods a significant portion of their diets. Back in the 1930s--before processed foods were universally available in the most remote locations-people living on isolated sea coasts tended to live long, have magnificent health, and perfect teeth. See also: _Kelp meal._