5 Yard Dash

I know what I'm doing this weekend:

5  cubic yards of compost

I also just got back from attending the MSU Horticulture Gardens plant sale where I picked up some Big Rainbow, Azoychka, and Persimmon tomatoes (only $1 per four-pack!), a Tigger melon, and an armenian cucumber. I also nabbed a few gorgeous coneflowers (in shades of yellow and orange) and some pink dwarf cosmos that were leftover from experiments from my fellow floriculture researchers.

First Attempt: Hot Composting

Two weekends ago I built my first ever "legit" compost bin. I'm attempting to get some hot composting action to happen!

The main reason I built this new compost bin was because it was time to dismantle the bin from last year. I also really really needed to mow the lawn and clean out the 1-year accumulation of chicken bedding (I'm doing the deep-litter method, and it works great). This was the perfect opportunity to have enough "greens" and "browns" available all at the same time...which is exactly what you need to build a hot compost pile.

I started my bin with a layer of "browns", stuff that didn't fully compost in my cold compost bin from last year, followed by several bags of fresh grass clippings, and plenty of water.

For my next "brown" layer (which actually had lots of "green" chicken poop mixed in) I used year-old chicken bedding including the compressed poop patties I found during my archeological dig into their coop.

At least one of my "green" layers also included two-dozen egg shells, some liquidized carrots I found in the back of my fridge, and some other random rotting goodies.

Since my yard is absolutely enormous (and I can never mow it all in one go-round), I mowed only as much as I needed to achieve each grass clipping layer. Some might call that lazy...others might call it efficient!

I finished off 8 layers in one afternoon. When I went outside the next morning, my bin had collapsed (it had been really windy), but luckily the lasagna-esque pile was still intact.

You can really see how compressed the bottom layers became compared to the layers at the top. I eventually added two more layers (for a total of 10). I'm going to wait 7 to 10 days before turning the pile...and hopefully it will heat up in the meantime!

Aged Eggs

I've been getting eggs from my chickens for over 6 months now and I recently realized that I still had a carton (or two, shh) of their eggs way back from the beginning. I opened up the carton and started laughing because they used to be so tiny! Here's a side-by-side shot of last week's eggs on the left (notice that the Aracuana is not laying) next to the first round of eggs on the right.

I decided it was probably time to get rid of the 6-month-old eggs, so I cracked them down the garbage disposal and put the shells in the compost pile. Amazingly, even though they seemed a little shrunken inside, not a single one smelled off...even after 6 months.

These'll make a nice addition to the compost heap.

What's In My Compost Bin

I'm really proud that I keep adding to my compost bins all winter long. I realize that my bins are probably frozen solid and not doing much (I've never been able to achieve a hot compost pile), but at least I'll have all kinds of tasty layers built up over the winter. Oh, the potential!

Snow (lame), banana peel, lime peel, healthy sprinkling of chicken poop

More chicken poop (and feathers) in the foreground, grapefruit peels, carrot and grapefruit pulp from my new juicer.

Carrot shavings from last nights stir-fray, lime peel, banana peel, and yet more chicken "sprinkles"

Free Leaf Mulch!

One of the students in the horticulture lab I teach offered to deliver some chopped leaf mulch from his landscaping business. How could I turn that down?

I got four garbage cans full of mixed chopped leaves and grass. Although 4 cans didn't sound like much, it was enough to cover almost my entire garden in a couple inches of the stuff.

Mulch waiting to be distributed to other beds.

Now I have the majority of my garden cleared, weeded, and tucked-in for the winter!

Four Cubic Yards of Compost!

I recently purchases four cubic yards of compost from a local landscape company. Two years ago (when I first moved into my house) I purchased 7 cubic yards of topsoil/compost mix from them...and they delivered it to the wrong house! Can you imagine 7 cubic yards (i.e. a small mountain) randomly being dumped in your driveway? 

This time I made it very very clear what my address is, what color the house is, what side of the street I live on, and I also put a huge bright blue tarp on the driveway where I wanted them to dump the stuff (kind of like X marks the spot). They got the delivery correct this time and I was surprised by how huge the pile was. It didn't quite fit on the tarp as you can see from the photo. 

I'm hoping this load of compost will go a long way to enriching all the new beds I added this year as well as filling in my raised beds (which have settled to almost half-volume over the course of two years).

Winter Compost Bin

The melting snow revealed quite a mess in my compost bin. I've been adding stuff to it all winter, layer upon layer (pet bedding, egg shells, freezer burned vegetables, cardboard, kleenex, carrot peels, etc.).

Hopefully with warmer weather, the contents of the bin will actually start to decompose. It looks kind of gross right now...especially the brain-like cauliflower in the upper right-hand corner (can you find it?).

I should probably stop adding citrus peels to my compost bin, they never seem to decompose.

What's in my compost bin

I have several composting areas in my yard. I have a large area for leaves and twigs and two smaller bins for kitchen waste, weeds, paper, and pet bedding (and the associated manure). This compost bin is right outside the backdoor of my house.  It's very convenient for disposing of vegetable scraps and other kitchen waste.

Frostbitten nasturtium plants, tomatoes, romaine, potting soil, and leaves are a few of the things at the top of my compost pile right now.