SOIL IS THE STRATEGY.
Farm Bokashi Bran for Livestock Bedding, Manure & Composting
Farm Bokashi Bran for Livestock Bedding, Manure & Composting
10kg -Trial Size - Poultry and Smallholders
£55.95
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£55.95
Prices include VAT where applicable and we can provide a VAT receipt.
Pickup available at Lower Blakemere Farm
Usually ready in 5+ days
We Deliver by hand within 10 Miles or can send with our courier.
Dry, farm-made Bokashi Bran for cattle, sheep, goats, poultry, deep-litter bedding, manure and composting. Made here at Lower Blakemere Farm in batches of around three tonnes — and used in our own cattle sheds.
Why use Bokashi Bran in animal bedding?
For us, the attraction is actually very simple.
We’re already putting straw underneath our cattle. We’re already going to have to muck it out. And eventually we want the nutrients and organic matter in that manure back on the land.
So rather than waiting until mucking-out day before we start thinking about the biology, we start while the bedding is still underneath the animals.
We scatter our dry Bokashi Bran through fresh bedding, particularly in the wetter and muckier areas, and let the animals do most of the mixing.
The benefits we’re looking for are:
-
Less of that sharp ammonia smell. This is one of the most noticeable differences in our own deep-litter cattle sheds.
-
A fresher atmosphere in livestock housing, alongside proper ventilation and plenty of dry bedding.
-
Very easy application. No tanks, pumps, hoses or sprayers — simply scatter it as you bed up.
-
The animals mix it for you. Cattle, sheep and goats trample it through the bedding and chickens scratch it around.
-
Earlier biological processing of the muck. Fermentation and microbial activity begin while the manure is still in the shed.
-
Better integrated bedding and manure. In our experience the straw, dung and urine are much more thoroughly worked together by mucking-out time.
-
A useful head start for the composting process. It is not finished compost when it leaves the shed, but it has already started its journey.
-
A practical way of thinking about nutrient cycling. Ammonia is one route by which nitrogen can leave manure, so managing manure well matters if we want to retain its value.
-
One product can follow the whole process. Bedding first, then manure and composting afterwards.
There’s no magic involved.
It’s simply another way of working with the biology already happening in manure and bedding rather than ignoring it until the muck reaches the heap.
Dry, farm-made Bokashi Bran for cattle, sheep, goats, poultry, deep-litter bedding, manure and composting. Made here at Lower Blakemere Farm in batches of around three tonnes — and used in our own cattle sheds.
Why use Bokashi Bran in animal bedding?
For us, the attraction is actually very simple.
We’re already putting straw underneath our cattle. We’re already going to have to muck it out. And eventually we want the nutrients and organic matter in that manure back on the land.
So rather than waiting until mucking-out day before we start thinking about the biology, we start while the bedding is still underneath the animals.
We scatter our dry Bokashi Bran through fresh bedding, particularly in the wetter and muckier areas, and let the animals do most of the mixing.
The benefits we’re looking for are:
-
Less of that sharp ammonia smell. This is one of the most noticeable differences in our own deep-litter cattle sheds.
-
A fresher atmosphere in livestock housing, alongside proper ventilation and plenty of dry bedding.
-
Very easy application. No tanks, pumps, hoses or sprayers — simply scatter it as you bed up.
-
The animals mix it for you. Cattle, sheep and goats trample it through the bedding and chickens scratch it around.
-
Earlier biological processing of the muck. Fermentation and microbial activity begin while the manure is still in the shed.
-
Better integrated bedding and manure. In our experience the straw, dung and urine are much more thoroughly worked together by mucking-out time.
-
A useful head start for the composting process. It is not finished compost when it leaves the shed, but it has already started its journey.
-
A practical way of thinking about nutrient cycling. Ammonia is one route by which nitrogen can leave manure, so managing manure well matters if we want to retain its value.
-
One product can follow the whole process. Bedding first, then manure and composting afterwards.
There’s no magic involved.
It’s simply another way of working with the biology already happening in manure and bedding rather than ignoring it until the muck reaches the heap.
How we use it at Lower Blakemere
We use Bokashi Bran in our deep-litter cattle sheds here at Lower
Blakemere Farm.
As fresh straw goes down, we scatter a light application of Bokashi Bran
over it, concentrating particularly on wetter or heavily soiled places.
Then we leave the cattle to do what cattle are very good at doing.
Walk about.
Several hundred kilos of cow turns out to be a remarkably effective
bedding mixer.
As the cattle move around, they work the Bokashi Bran through the straw,
dung and urine, and the whole bed gradually becomes a mixed biological mass
rather than separate layers of clean straw and manure.
We don’t spend time trying to carefully mix every handful through the
bedding because that isn’t necessary. The bran is acting as a carrier for
the microbial inoculant. Once it reaches suitable moisture and organic
material, the microbial ecology begins to change.
Farmer Phil probably notices the practical effects more than anyone:
“For me the biggest difference is the atmosphere in the shed. There’s
much less of that sharp ammonia smell, so it feels much fresher for us and the
cattle. It’s easy because we put the Bokashi in as we bed up and the cattle do
the mixing. Then when we muck out, the straw and manure have already been
worked together and started breaking down. It comes out well and, by the time
we’re putting it back onto the land, it has already had a really useful head
start.”
— Farmer Phil, Lower Blakemere Farm
That is our observation on our farm rather than a laboratory measurement
of ammonia, and we think it’s important to make that distinction.
But when you work amongst livestock every day, what happens to the
bedding and the atmosphere in the building matters.
How much Bokashi Bran should I use?
We deliberately don’t give a rigid kilograms-per-square-metre
application rate for livestock bedding.
A dry hen house is not the same environment as a duck house. A
deep-litter cattle shed is different again. Stocking density, bedding depth,
moisture, ventilation, temperature and how frequently you bed up will all
affect what happens.
Our approach is:
Scatter it lightly over fresh bedding.
Add a little extra to wetter, muckier and more heavily soiled areas,
then add another light scattering when you put down fresh bedding.
Think:
Little and often, rather than one enormous application. Every couple of
weeks is best practise
The aim is not to coat every piece of straw with Bokashi Bran.
You are inoculating a biological system.
Once suitable microorganisms encounter moisture, nutrients and an
appropriate environment, they can become metabolically active and populations
can multiply. Those populations will not grow indefinitely regardless of
conditions — microbes still need the right temperature, moisture, food and
environment — which is why adding another light application as fresh bedding
goes down makes practical sense.
We would much rather you trialled Bokashi sensibly and adjusted it to
your own system than used an artificially precise rate which may bear very
little relationship to your farm.
We use Effective Microorganisms with Mollasses and Wheat Bran to make the
Farm Bokashi Bran and Liquid Effective Microorganisms can also be applied to
livestock systems and those systems may suit some large farms very well.
But one of the things we particularly like about Bokashi Bran is just how
easy it is.
There’s:
no mixing tank,
no dilution calculation,
no sprayer,
no pump,
no hose,
and nothing to wash out afterwards.
You pick up the dry bran, scatter it while bedding up and let the animals
do the rest.
The wheat bran acts as the physical carrier for the microbial culture,
putting it directly amongst the organic material where we want biological
activity to begin.
That makes it particularly useful for smaller farms and smallholders, but
we find the simplicity really valuable at farm scale too.
The liquid system is effectively taking the microbes to the bedding in
water.
The dry Bokashi system takes them there on fermented bran.
Both approaches are ways of delivering a microbial inoculant. We simply
find the dry version extraordinarily easy to incorporate into an existing
bedding routine.
Bokashi is fundamentally a fermentation process.
That distinction is quite important because Bokashi and conventional
composting are not the same thing.
Conventional composting is predominantly aerobic — microorganisms
decompose organic matter in the presence of oxygen, producing heat, carbon
dioxide and progressively more stable organic material.
Bokashi starts differently.
A microbial inoculant is introduced to organic material and fermentation
takes place under relatively low-oxygen conditions.
Modern Bokashi systems are closely associated with the work of Professor
Teruo Higa, now Professor Emeritus of the University of the Ryukyus in
Okinawa, Japan.
Professor Higa developed the concept of Effective Microorganisms — EM
— during his work in horticulture, and EM was commercialised in 1982. The
original liquid microbial inoculant is known as EM-1.
EM-1 contains several groups of naturally occurring microorganisms, with
EM Research Organization describing the principal groups as lactic-acid
bacteria, yeasts and phototrophic bacteria.
We use EM-1 when making our Bokashi Bran here at Lower Blakemere.
Our Bokashi Bran starts with wheat bran.
We combine the bran with EM-1, molasses and water and mix everything
thoroughly using our agricultural mixer.
Molasses provides a readily available source of carbohydrate for the
fermenting microorganisms.
The wet inoculated bran is then packed into large sealed bags with as
much air excluded as practical and allowed to ferment.
That basic process — bran, EM-1, molasses, water and low-oxygen
fermentation — is consistent with EM Research Organization’s own guidance for
making EM Bokashi using rice or wheat bran.
Once fermented, we dry our Bokashi Bran in the grain store.
Reducing the moisture makes the finished bran much easier to store,
handle, transport and scatter. EMRO itself includes drying as a way of storing
fermented Bokashi for longer periods.
Then we bag it.
A normal production run for us is around three tonnes.
So although many people first encounter Bokashi Bran in a small bag
beside a kitchen composting bucket, we make ours here with agricultural
machinery, by the tonne, on a working farm.
Farm sizes
10kg — £46.63 + VAT
Ideal for smallholders, poultry, smaller livestock systems or trying Bokashi in part of a larger shed.
20kg — £66.63 + VAT
Our main farm-size option for regular livestock bedding use.
50kg — £158.29 + VAT
For larger sheds, several pens or regular bedding, manure and compost use. Supplied in manageable bags totalling 50kg.
100kg — £291.63 + VAT
For larger farms and established users. Supplied in manageable bags totalling 100kg.
Need 250kg, 500kg, pallet quantities or regular farm supply?
We manufacture our Bokashi Bran here at Lower Blakemere Farm in batches of around three tonnes, so please contact us to talk about larger quantities, collection and farm delivery.
What happens when the dry bran gets
wet again?
Drying greatly slows biological activity because microorganisms need
available water for active metabolism.
Once the bran reaches moist bedding containing manure, urine and other
organic material, conditions change again.
The carrier starts taking up moisture and the microbial community enters
a new environment containing water, carbon compounds and nutrients.
The microorganisms that are suited to those conditions can become active
and multiply, while the wider microbial community in the bedding also changes.
That is why we think of Bokashi Bran as a starter or inoculant,
rather than imagining that every microorganism needed to process the bedding
has to arrive in the original handful of bran.
Recent microbiological research into Bokashi fermentation has found
dynamic microbial communities dominated particularly by lactic-acid bacteria,
alongside metabolic pathways capable of producing a range of organic acids.
This is one of the fascinating things about working with biology.
We introduce a relatively small biological input into an environment that
is already absolutely full of microbial life.
What happens next depends on the conditions we create.
Why are lactic-acid bacteria
interesting?
Lactic-acid bacteria are not exotic organisms.
Humans have been making use of them for thousands of years in fermented
foods.
They metabolise carbohydrates and produce organic acids, particularly
lactic acid.
That matters because changing the chemical and microbial environment can
favour fermentation rather than some of the pathways associated with
putrefaction.
The overall Bokashi system is more complicated than simply saying “lactic
acid bacteria stop smells” — microbial ecosystems rarely oblige us by being
that simple — but fermentation can influence pH, available substrates and which
organisms become competitive within the material.
The 2026 review of on-farm composting systems for regenerative
agriculture describes Bokashi as a form of lactic-acid fermentation and
specifically notes that Effective Microorganisms may be added to livestock
bedding to initiate fermentation during the housing period, with decomposition
then completed during covered storage after clean-out.
That description is remarkably close to what we are actually doing here.
What is happening to nitrogen and
ammonia?
This is one of the main reasons livestock bedding is so interesting biologically.
Manure and urine contain nitrogen.
In cattle, a significant route to ammonia begins when urea in urine is broken down by the enzyme urease after urine and faeces come into contact. AHDB identifies this breakdown of urea as a major source of ammonia in livestock production.
Nitrogen can exist in manure as ammonium, NH₄⁺, and ammonia, NH₃.
The balance between those forms is strongly influenced by pH and temperature, while moisture, air movement, bedding and manure management affect how much ammonia is ultimately released.
That familiar sharp smell in a livestock building is therefore more than simply “the smell of muck”.
It is part of the nitrogen cycle.
And ammonia leaving the manure represents nitrogen leaving the manure
too.
AHDB specifically points out that careful manure management can improve retention of ammonium nitrogen and help retain manure's value as fertiliser.
So there are two reasons we're interested in it.
Firstly, ammonia is an air-quality issue.
Secondly, nitrogen is valuable.
We would rather keep nutrients moving around the farm than unnecessarily
lose them into the atmosphere.
Why ammonia matters for the animals
too
Good air quality matters in livestock housing.
Ammonia is irritating to eyes and respiratory tissues at elevated concentrations, which is why ventilation, bedding condition, drainage and manure management are all important.
AHDB's cattle-housing guidance notes that ammonia at 25ppm can irritate mucous membranes and increase susceptibility to respiratory disease in calves.
Poultry ammonia has been even more extensively researched. A major review
identifies ammonia as an important air-quality and animal-welfare issue and
recommends keeping poultry-house concentrations below 25ppm.
None of this means Bokashi replaces good husbandry.
It doesn't.
If a drinker is leaking, fix the drinker.
If bedding is soaking wet, add dry bedding and sort out the moisture.
Buildings still need appropriate ventilation and sensible stocking rates.
Bokashi is another tool within that system — not an excuse for getting the basics wrong.
So does Bokashi actually reduce
ammonia?
There is encouraging science, but this is one area where we think farmers deserve a sensible answer rather than a miraculous one.
A peer-reviewed 2023 study investigated Effective Microorganism treatments in poultry manure. The EM treatments reduced manure malodours, and the improvement was associated particularly with lower ammonia levels compared with the untreated controls.
Other microbial inoculant research has also shown that altering microbial communities during manure composting can change ammonia emissions, reinforcing the broader principle that manure microbiology and gaseous nitrogen losses are connected.
But there is an important caveat.
That doesn't mean we can take the result from a controlled poultry experiment and claim that putting our Bokashi Bran into any cattle shed will reduce ammonia by a guaranteed percentage.
We can't.
Different species, bedding, temperatures, microbial products, housing systems and application rates will produce different results.
There has also been research on EM treatment of cattle slurry where measurable improvements in nitrogen losses or grass production were not demonstrated.
And a four-year field trial of EM as an agricultural soil treatment found no consistent yield or soil-microbiology benefit attributable to the living EM organisms themselves.
We actually think that makes this story more interesting rather than less.
EM is not magic.
The science around broad claims such as automatically increasing crop yields is mixed.
The areas we find particularly interesting are much more specific: fermentation,
manure management, odour, bedding biology and the transition from fresh organic waste towards composting.
And that is where we're using it ourselves.
Think about what is happening in a deep-litter shed.
We have:
carbon in the straw,
nitrogen in the manure and urine,
moisture,
warmth,
an enormous existing microbial population,
and cattle constantly physically mixing everything together.
Biology is already happening whether we intervene or not.
Using Bokashi is about trying to influence the direction of that
biology rather than imagining we are starting it from scratch.
This is also why repeated light applications make more sense to us than
trying to put down a massive quantity at the beginning.
Each new layer of straw creates a new habitat and a new supply of organic
material.
A light addition of Bokashi introduces the inoculant into that new
material.
Then the cattle do the mixing.
This is perhaps the most important part of the whole system.
We do not call the material coming out of the shed finished compost.
Bokashi fermentation and mature compost are not the same thing.
What has happened is that the straw, urine and manure have already been:
mixed,
trampled,
moistened,
inoculated,
fermented to some degree,
and biologically worked on.
We tend to describe it on the farm as pre-composted muck.
That's useful farm shorthand rather than a formal compost classification.
More accurately, it is material that has already begun its biological
journey and now needs further decomposition and stabilisation.
So instead of:
shed → raw muck → begin doing something with it
we're moving towards:
shed → biological activity and fermentation → muck out → further
composting → soil
A major 2026 review of on-farm composting systems describes exactly this
sort of approach: EM can be incorporated into livestock bedding during housing,
followed by further decomposition during covered storage after clean-out.
For a smallholding, the next stage can be beautifully simple.
Three pallets can make the back and sides of a manure-composting bay.
Fill it with your bedding and manure and mix in other suitable organic
materials if you have them — spent plants, flower waste, crop residues, leaves
and similar materials can all become part of the system.
For a smaller heap, put a tarpaulin or roof over the top to stop excessive rain going through it.
Don't necessarily wrap the whole thing airtight.
Once you're moving towards conventional composting, oxygen becomes an
important part of decomposition.
Larger farms should obviously use manure storage and composting systems
appropriate to their operation and regulatory requirements.
And there is another important distinction:
Bokashi treatment is not proof that manure has been sanitised.
If you need compost to reach temperatures sufficient to substantially
reduce pathogens or viable weed seeds, you need to properly manage and monitor
a hot-composting process.
Fresh farmyard manure can be awkward material.
Long straw.
Wet lumps.
Dry bits.
Concentrated manure.
Different areas at completely different stages of decomposition.
A deep bed that cattle have spent months trampling has already undergone
an enormous amount of physical processing.
In our experience, Bokashi-treated material is also noticeably more
integrated when it comes out.
Further composting then allows fungi, aerobic bacteria and other
organisms to continue the process.
Ultimately we're trying to create more stable organic matter that can
go back to the soil.
Because manure isn't waste
This is the bigger point for us.
We've grown or bought the feed.
We've grown or bought the bedding.
The animals have converted those materials into manure containing
nutrients and carbon.
Calling that “waste” doesn't make a lot of sense.
What matters is how well we cycle it.
We want to move from:
soil → plant → animal → manure → microbes → compost → soil
rather than simply treating muck as something to get rid of.
That is very much part of the regenerative farming direction we're taking
at Lower Blakemere.
And the soil is alive
One of our favourite soil facts still sounds completely ridiculous:
There can be more microorganisms in a teaspoon of healthy soil than there are people on Earth.
Those communities include bacteria, fungi, protozoa, nematodes and huge numbers of other organisms involved in breaking down organic matter, cycling nutrients and creating soil structure.
The point isn't that adding Bokashi somehow creates all of that biology.
It doesn't.
The point is that farming is taking place in a system which is biological as well as chemical and physical.
And the more we learn about soil, the more interested we become in feeding and managing the whole system rather than simply supplying N, P and K to a crop.
A note about putting Bokashi Bran
in animal feed
You may come across information about EM or fermented microbial products being used in animal feed.
That is a different use.
Farm Bokashi Bran sold here is intended for bedding, manure and composting, not as a livestock feed additive.
In Great Britain, products used as feed additives must be authorised for the particular purpose for which they are marketed and used.
So please don't simply add this product to livestock rations.
Use it in the bedding, where it already has plenty to do.
What Bokashi will — and won't — do
It can:
Help introduce a fermentative microbial inoculant into bedding and manure.
Be extremely easy to incorporate into normal bedding routines.
Be distributed naturally by livestock movement.
Help manage manure odours under suitable conditions — supported by research in some manure systems and by our own observations on the farm.
Start biological processing before mucking-out day.
Provide a useful first stage before further composting.
It won't:
Replace ventilation.
Dry out a waterlogged shed.
Fix a leaking drinker.
Make poor husbandry good.
Guarantee a particular percentage reduction in ammonia.
Instantly turn fresh manure into mature compost.
Guarantee pathogen or weed-seed destruction.
Automatically transform crop yields simply because it contains EM.
We'd rather be clear about that.
A sensible way to trial Bokashi on
your farm
If you've never used it before, don't change your entire winter housing system overnight.
Pick one shed, one pen or one section of bedding.
Scatter the Bokashi Bran lightly as fresh bedding goes down.
Use a little extra where conditions are wet or heavily soiled.
Then continue bedding normally.
Observe:
What does the shed smell like?
Is there less of the sharp ammonia smell?
What is happening underneath the fresh straw?
What does the muck look and feel like when you clean out?
How does it behave once stacked or composted?
If you have two reasonably comparable areas, treating one and leaving one untreated can be even more useful.
That's not a perfect scientific trial.
But it is very useful farming.
Start with the science.
Try it.
Observe it.
Then decide whether it earns its place.
Frequently asked questions
How much Farm Bokashi Bran should I use?
Use a light scattering over fresh bedding, concentrating a little
more on wet or heavily soiled areas.
Add another light application as fresh bedding goes down.
We don't specify a universal kg/m² rate because livestock housing varies
too much for that to be genuinely useful.
How often should I apply it?
For deep-litter systems, apply little and often as you bed up
rather than using one large treatment.
Do I need to mix it in?
Generally, no.
Cattle, sheep and goats will trample it through the bedding, while
poultry will scratch it around.
That's one of the main reasons we find it so easy to use.
Is dry Bokashi better than liquid EM?
Not necessarily — they're different methods of delivering a microbial
inoculant.
Liquid systems can be very suitable for large farms equipped to mix and
spray them.
We like dry bran because it is extremely simple to store, carry and
spread, with no spraying equipment required.
Will the microbes multiply?
Suitable microorganisms can become active and multiply when the dry bran
encounters appropriate moisture, nutrients and environmental conditions.
They won't multiply indefinitely regardless of conditions, which is why
maintaining good bedding conditions and adding a little more Bokashi with fresh
bedding makes sense.
Does it reduce ammonia?
Published research has shown reductions in ammonia and malodour from some
EM-treated manure systems, particularly poultry manure.
On our own farm we notice considerably less of the characteristic sharp
ammonia smell in the cattle sheds where we use Bokashi.
We don't claim a guaranteed percentage reduction because results will
vary between systems.
Is the material compost when I muckout?
No.
We call it pre-composted muck, but technically it is partially
processed organic material that needs further decomposition and stabilisation.
Bokashi is a fermentation stage, not automatically finished compost.
Can I add it to the manure heap too?
Yes.
You can add a light scattering as manure, bedding and other suitable
organic materials are assembled.
For conventional composting afterwards, remember that oxygen, moisture
and the carbon-to-nitrogen balance become important.
Can I use it with chicken bedding?
Yes. Chickens are particularly useful because they scratch and distribute
it themselves.
Pay particular attention to areas underneath perches, near drinkers and
anywhere manure accumulates.
Can I use it with ducks?
Yes, but moisture management comes first. Deal with excessive water and
provide sufficient absorbent bedding.
Can I use it with sheep and goats?
Yes. Scatter it lightly into the bedding as you bed up and allow the
animals to trample it through.
Can I feed it to my animals?
No. This Farm Bokashi Bran is sold for bedding, manure and composting
use, not as an authorised livestock feed additive.
How Should I store it?
Keep the bag sealed, dry and out of direct sunlight.
Moisture encourages biological activity, so keep unused bran dry until
you need it.
Why buy Farm Bokashi from Lower
Blakemere?
Mainly because we actually make it and use it.
Our Bokashi Bran isn't something we've bought from a wholesaler and relabelled as a farm product.
We mix it here.
We ferment it here.
We dry it here.
We bag it here.
We make around three tonnes at a time.
And then we take some of it across the yard and use it in our own cattle sheds.
We're still learning, because that is the nature of biological farming.
There is good science around fermentation, manure microbiology, ammonia formation and soil biology.
There is promising evidence for microbial manure treatments.
There is also research showing that some of the broader claims made for EM have not always been reproduced.
We think farmers should know both.
So we're not promising miracles.
We're offering something much simpler:
a farm-made microbial inoculant that is extraordinarily easy to use, that fits naturally into livestock bedding and manure management, that we use ourselves, and that makes biological sense as part of a wider system of cycling organic matter back to the soil.
The science behind this page
For anyone who wants to dig further, some of the key science and guidance
behind the information above includes:
Addeo et al., 2023 — Environmental Science and Pollution Research
Effective Microorganism treatment of poultry manure reduced malodour associated
particularly with lower ammonia levels.
Cooper, Mackintosh & Willoughby, 2026 — On-farm composting systems
for regenerative agriculture: a review
Reviews Bokashi/lactic-acid fermentation alongside other farm composting
systems and specifically discusses EM use in livestock bedding followed by
decomposition during covered storage.
Mayer et al., 2010 — Applied Soil Ecology
A useful counterbalance: a four-year organic field experiment found no
crop-yield or soil-microbial effect attributable to living EM organisms,
illustrating why broad claims for EM should be treated cautiously.
AHDB — Reducing ammonia emissions in UK cattle housing
Explains cattle-manure nitrogen, urea breakdown, ammonia volatilisation and the
importance of temperature, pH, bedding and manure management.
EM Research Organization, Japan
Primary source for Professor Teruo Higa, the development of EM, EM-1
composition and the traditional production of EM Bokashi using bran, molasses,
water and low-oxygen fermentation.