(Music: THE WORD, Lennon-McCartney) (info./disclaimers [0]) (glossary [0]) (index [0]) (gardening guide [0])

Chicken turds will make you free
Use horse turds and be like me
Rabbit turds I'm thinking of
Cattle turds, the word is dung
It's so fine, it's sunshine, it's a turd, dung

In the beginning, I misunderstood
But now I've got it, a turd is good

Turkey turds will make you free
Spread goat turds and be like me
Llama turds I'm thinking of
Rhino turds, the word is dung
It's so fine, it's sunshine, it's a turd, dung

Everywhere I go, I hear it said
In the good and the bad books that I have read

Compost turds, and you'll be free
You can pile them separately
Or you can layer them with plants
Green and dry, C:N balanced
It's so fine, it's sunshine, it's a turd, dung

Now I know what animals feel must be right
Factory-farmed turds are traumatized by their plight

But with good turds your garden sings
Earthworm turds are called castings
Human turds are still taboo
But they make good compost too
It's so fine, it's sunshine, it's a turd, dung

It's a turd, dung, it's a turd, dung, it's a turd, dung, it's a turd, dung

Comments: Despite its overly-perfunctory treatment of the moral ambiguity of using manure from factory farms, this has become a Beetless classic. "C:N balanced" refers to the correct ratio of carbon to nitrogen when constructing a compost pile (about 25:1 at the outset). On composting human turds, see The Humanure Handbook by J.C. Jenkins. Dung is indeed sunshine, in a different form.

Excerpted from The Beetless' Gardening Book: An Organic Gardening Songbook/Guidebook, copyright 1997 by Chris Roth (info./disclaimers [0]) (glossary [0]) (index [0]) (gardening guide [0])