BETHEL, N.Y. — A judge has ordered an upstate New York farmer to stop using eggshells as fertilizer after neighboring businesses complained the smell and clouds of flies drove away customers.

The Times Herald-Record of Middletown reports Peter Hofstee has been applying crushed eggshells to his hay fields in the Sullivan County town of Bethel since his usual fertilizer of liquid duck manure was cut off by the supplier last summer.

The owners of a restaurant and a distilling company adjacent to the fields took Hofstee to court, saying the rotting eggshells caused an unbearable stench and served as a source of fly larvae.

A state Supreme Court judge ordered the farmer to remove his eggshell stockpiles and rid his fields of fly larvae.

Hofstee says the ruling will put him out of business.