01-001 C.M.R. ch. 565, § 4 - Farms Required to Have an NMP

1. AnNMP is required for farms that meet one or more of the following criteria:

A. The farm confines and feeds 50 or more animal units at any one time;1

B. The farm stores or utilizes more than 100 tons of solid manure or 25,000 gallons of liquid cow manure, per year, not generated on that farm;

C. The farm is the subject of a verified complaint of improper manure handling2;

D. The farm stores or utilizes regulated residuals.

2. A person who owns or operates a farm shall implement an approved NMP for that farm, unless exempted by statute or §4.4 of these Rules.

3. The NMP must be prepared and signed by a certified NMP specialist or approved and signed by a certified NMP specialist, pursuant to the provisions of § 7 of these Rules.

4. Farms/operations that are not required to develop an NMP:

A. Crop farms storing and/or utilizing commercially manufactured chemical fertilizers are not required to develop and implement an NMP unless the farm is storing and/or utilizing manure or regulated residuals.

B. For crop farms, only the land on which manure, or regulated residual are applied must be covered by the NMP.

C. Small on-farm poultry or livestock/dairy product processing or vegetable processing operations generating and disposing of small volumes of process waste water annually from these activities, and which are not required to develop and implement a nutrient management plan under §4 of these Rules, may implement BMPs, approved by the Department, in lieu of developing and implementing an NMP.

D. An entity to which manure is transferred, which is not a farm or farming operation as defined by these Rules, e.g., a commercial composting operation that is regulated by the DEP, is not required to develop and implement an NMP.

Notes

01-001 C.M.R. ch. 565, § 4

Note: This means that the farm confines and feeds any combination of animals totaling 50,000 lb. live animal weight. Without limitation, some examples are :

24 dairy cows (plus an equivalent number of young cattle) (1400 lb/mature animal)

35 dairy cows with no young cattle(1400 lb/animal)

50 beef cows (1000 lb/animal)

125 sows or finishing pigs (400 lb/animal)

1000 feeder pigs (50 lb/animal)

50 horses (1000 lb/animal)

500 sheep (100 lb/animal)

2800 turkeys (18 lb/animal)

10,000 laying hens/broilers (5 lb/animal).

Note: Complaints are usually handled under the '"Maine Agriculture Protection Act", 7 M.R.S. Chapter 6.