You just want a bigger pile? Whats the issue here, your pile is not breaking down or getting hot enough currently?

#1. Mulch will take a long time to break down
#2. Lots of brown(carbon) material

Plenty of other stuff to put in a pile. Grass clippings, coffee grounds, paper, shredded paper, leaves.

I say leave the mulch to be used as mulch.

If our plan is to simply keep comopsting until our pile reaches desireable size (don't know how big yet) and time is no problem is this a good idea?

Why would you do this? You have to break down big wood chips. How long do you think this will take?

Dan

Do you have junk mail? Every day the mail man delivers me a ton of junk that I shred and compost. Next to fall leaves, its the primary component of browns in my pile. In the spring and summer, its about the only component of browns in my pile.

I wouldn't BUY anything to compost...

If the wood chips are FREE and you don't have anything for browns, then I MIGHT compost them.

Actually when composting wood, I would try to go smaller particles, like sawdust. Do you know any carpenters or wood shops with a bag system to separate out the dust?

Do any of your neighbors have any fall leaves that just haven't gotten rid of yet?

Our city has a municipal landscape waste collection site... if your nice to the guy at the gate, sometimes he will let you take stuff instead of dropping it off...

Call Starbucks and ask them to give you their used coffee grounds in the morning. You will be rewarded with about 25lbs or more of coffee groups per day to add to your pile. I just added 100 lbs yet I am collecting more for other uses around the garden and the yard.

May I make a small point? You all know that 'mulch' doesn't necessarily mean wood chips, right? Mulch means something you put on your ground to suppress weeds, keep moisture from evaporating as quickly, and to keep soil cool.

So, while I know that a lot of people automatically realized that you used the word 'mulch' when you really meant wood chips, I thought, "Why would anyone put 'mulch' on their compost pile? How odd."

If I had a pile that I wanted to take a looong time to break down, I'd put wood chips in it. But I can't imagine any reason that I'd want a pile to take a long while to break down. Maybe if I was going to jail for a long time and I didn't want anyone pilfering my compost in my absence. I can see that.

I wouldn't turn any wood chips away, mind you, but I sure wouldn't put them in any pile I hoped to get compost out of in the next two years or more. I'd start a separate wood chip pile.

The OP stated ''The mulch we are thinking of adding is from a local dealer that chips anything including trees, pallets, and doors. ''

When I opened it I thought maybe some one was removing last years mulch that had faded or something. That would be more suitable. I mulch w/ straw and leaves so definitely, but I'd leave it in place.

As stated above, buying ingredients especially slow to break down woody products is probably best left alone. Plenty of sources of free product if attaining size is all that is needed. I still see OPBL left on the street w/ the grass clippings. I have enough so don't get them but did last fall.

OPBL = other peoples bagged leaves.

Thanks for the info. My boss just wanted a "bigger pile" and we had excess mulch (wood chips) from last year. He really doesn't understand alot about composting (even less than I do) and was just looking for anything to mix in to bloster the size. I ended talking him out of it.
Thanks again.