How I compost

9 years ago

last modified: 9 years ago

Over the years I have gone out of my way to make a hot compost. I had spent too many hours manually shredding cardboard to bump up my carbon to nitrogen levels in my compost piles.

A few years ago I came across a article about cold composting. The process detailed was pretty hands off. To sum it up you used what was readily available. For me that is a lot of grass clippings during the warmer months with fall leaves during the colder months. Throw in weeds, pruning waste and personal coffee grounds in small quantities and that is the sum of my compost waste. I don't add any water and also do not cover the pile. I will turn piles about once a week and after a heavy rain.

Through trial and error I have found that when composting grass it's best to keep the pile height about 2 - 3 feet (1 meter) and to use multiple piles instead of one giant pile. This past summer we were in a severe drought and I only had to cut my grass a half dozen times at most. The compost pile looked like a pile of straw come the end of the summer. Earlier today I went out to start my fall leaves compost pile and this is what my grass compost looked like after a couple months of rain with Temps in the low 60's on average.

The grass has begun to break down and it has a nice earthy scent. There must of been 100 baby red wigglers in the one area I have dug in.

Today I started my fall leaves pile and all I am doing is packing them in and covering it with some old burlap so they don't blow away. If there is any interest I will followup this March with more photos.

If anyone has any questions I will do my best to answer.

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Comments (4)

User
9 years ago
The big question: where are you?

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That's my method too, because of the low effort. I usually have one bin that is being filled and one or more that are sitting around composting themselves.

Main ingredients are kitchen waste, kitty litter (urine-soaked sawdust from the pellet fuel we use, minus poop, so it's high nitrogen), leaves and weeds. Occasionally a small critter found dead in the yard is buried in the pile.

http://lazygardens.blogspot.com/2015/05/diy-cheap-compost-bin.html

Grass clippings can be layered with something that is very fibrous - dry weed stalks, pine needles, coarse sawdust, shredded cardboard or similar stuff to let air into the center of the stack. Otherwise they mat down and go anaerobic, stinky and slimy. If grass is your major input, consider inserting a chunk of those 4 or 6" perforated PVC pipes in the middle for extra air.

I have to water my bins because this is such a dry climate that even dead leaves last for several years. A couple months before I know I will need the compost, I systematically water the bins to accelerate the composting process.

I sift mine before use and toss the unfinished stuff into another bin.

http://lazygardens.blogspot.com/2015/05/diy-trommel-sifter-for-compost.html

And,because it's low temp and doesn't kill weed seeds ...

http://lazygardens.blogspot.com/2016/11/dealing-with-weed-seeds-in-compost.html

You can see from the pictures that it's pretty coarse, which is what the silty sand I have for dirt needs to hold some water in it.
John Donovan
Original Author
9 years ago
I live just outside of Boston.
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toxcrusadr
9 years ago
Your method sounds like it works pretty well. I leave most of my clippings on the lawn. I don't even use a mulching mower. By managing the actual mowing route, they can be spread evenly and almost invisibly across the lawn. I do bag some, mostly in the spring when it's not only growing fast but I have a lot of last fall's leaves saved up in a wire bin or piled on the garden with tomato cages to hold them down. Once all that is composted or used as degradable mulch for the gardens, I don't collect a lot of clippings till the last mowings in fall when they are mixed with leaves in the mower bag and ready to compost.
wayne_5 zone 6a Central Indiana
9 years ago
I leave most lawn clippings on the lawn, but in the spring there is some excess to take off.

I do have some waste veggies that go on a pile and at times I have a fair sized horse manure pile aging more until needed.

I used to make a huge leaf pile, but have learned how to make a 6 ft in diameter pile that is chopped, very, very fine which goes directly on the gaden beds.

I compost in situ the plant residues with shears and mower.