Using fresh compost...questions...
 

I have had a compost bin for a couple of years now. It looks like a large black trash bin with air vents on the sides and a locking lid. My MIL gave it to me as a gift and I have been using it, although I don't know much about composting.

We are vegetarians and so we have large quantities of suitable leftover material to add every few days. I drink lots of coffee, and add the grounds, and from time to time I add a layer of dry oak leaves or a little water. I turn it once or twice a week with a little "spear" thingy that came with it.

Anyway, it's been a slow pile and doesn't seem to heat up all that much, but after a couple of years I have about 2 feet of rich looking "dirt" in the bottom...so here are my questions...

Can this stuff burn my tomato plants? Should I amend my planting holes well ahead of time (like now maybe) so it will have time to "break down" further? I have never used homemade compost and can't quite believe that I've done everything right. Also, there is less broken down material mixed in (the more recent stuff) especially near the top. Should I stop putting in fresh stuff until it breaks down more and I use up what's there?

Any thoughts on all this would be appreciated. I'm sure there must be some experienced composters here to help me :)

Jennifer

A cold pile is exactly as you describe. You add things to it all the time, and the bottom of it turns into good soil. You can actually add your kitchen scraps directly to the garden if you really wanted, but pre-composting is best. Coffee grounds are a good dressing directly in the garden and supposedly drive fire ants out (along with dried molasses).

Adding small browned leaves or larger leaves chopped up with the lawnmower is a fantastic compost ingredient or you can add it directly to the garden as a layer.

If it's good compost with no odor, you can add it directly to the planting hole or the garden in general. I think adding it right now and mixing it into your soil and then reapplying mulch (black plastic to warm the soil or straw) would make the earthworms happy and they'd spend the next 4 months getting your garden ready. :)

To do a hot pile, I read in Vegetable Gardener's Bible by Ed Smith that you need a certain volume to get things going. Generally a 3' a 3' a 3' pile (27 cubic feet) that you add the stuff all at once and then walk away. The entire pile (after turning it a few times) will turn to compost at a steady rate. Most people don't have the materials to start a compost pile all at once and get this result, but if you have access to cow/horse/sheep/rabbit/elephant manure, straw, lots of dried leaves (chop them with your lawnmower), orange peels, coffee grounds (Starbucks will give you a bucket of spent grounds if you ask), etc. you can build a hot pile. I would check the Soil forum at GW or pick up the book I mentioned. The ratios are important. Too much nitrogen (generally called greens but includes manure, etc.) causes the pile to smell really bad.

As the pile goes through different stages, the temperature will change and different critters will be working on different parts of the pile. They are collectively called the [url=http://faq.gardenweb.com/faq/lists/organic/2002114848008095.html][b]microherd[/b][/url].

Just my opinions.

Would it be a good idea to add lime?

dcarch

Jen,

No, no and no.

I would add the compost into the hole mixing it with the soil when you plant the plant mainly cuz you have a limited amount of compost and I'd rather see it at the plants root system. If you add it now to an open hole, I think that nutrients will be leached out of it with each rain. Just my opinion. Compost is neutral (ph = 7.0) so it will not burn any plants. If you have room in the fall gather all the leaves you can and just let them sit and in time you'll have a lot of compost. I get 3 dump truck loads of shredded leaves from a fall cleanup guy that lives down the road from me. 3 loads from his truck is a lot of material and being shredded they break down faster.

You just can't have too much compost.

Tom

If you have black walnut leaves, I would suggest NOT adding them to your pile. They are a really good natural tomatocide or at least a stuntgrowther. Composting may take out the toxins, but why chance it.

Other than that, compost is a good thing for enriching the soil. Some may say too much of a good thing can be a bad thing. For my soil there is no such animal. I need all the help I can get.

My opinion is...
 

I agree with Feldon's summation. Work it into your planting area 2 months ahead of your planting. It sounds like its well broken down (2 years is like fine wine for compost) so it will not burn anything if directly added after planting, either.

I prefer to work it into the soil ahead of planting because you lose a good bit of of it's strength into the air if left on top of the ground.

You know a lot more about composting than you think. :wink:

DrR

Another item that will REALLY "jumpstart" a cold pile is the addition of feed grade molasses, either liquid or powder. The sugar in the molasses feeds the soil microbes, giving them the ever popular "sugar rush".
I have personally used this, it is like throwing gasoline on a fire! :D

Another question...

How good is rabbit manure for compost piles? My husband works for a pet store and they have rabbits. The rabbit poo would be mixed with pine bedding, and they change it daily. Would this be good for my compost?

BTW, my husband is slightly horrified, slightly amused that I would even think of such a thing. He told me up front "I'm not bringing home bagged rabbit s**t!!! You'll have to come get it yourself!"

Sigh...and his coworkers already probably think we're a little odd :)

Hey, it's all for the good of my garden, after all! So what if they think we're crazy :)

What do you all think?

Jennifer

(and thanks for all the suggestions so far!)

jenn_sc,

Just mabey you and your husband can do a lil trading you get rabbit poo he gets well supper!!!! (LOL)

You know the saying (a way to a mans heart is thru his stomach ) well we men will do alot of things for food :P !

jen,

rabbit manure is fine to compost and i would bring it home.

fwiw, rabbit manure is the only manure that can be used fresh out of the animal without the need to even age it. i am not aware if there is any other that can do this but if there is i'll bet i is llama manure.

tom

[quote=tjg911] i am not aware if there is any other that can do this but if there is i'll bet i is llama manure.

tom[/quote]

Right you are. Llama poop can be directly applied to your garden without fear of burning.

Being the "manure maniac", I totally agree about the rabbit poo! I actually learned something, because I did NOT know about the llama poo can also be applied "fresh" to the garden.
Gonna go introduce myself to a neighbor down the road who has a llama herd and work out a barter system - veggies for poo! :lol:

sheep and goat manure can also be applied fresh to the garden ' we been doing it for quite a few years now with good results. :D :D

Yes, add the compost that looks like dirt to the hole when you plant tomatoes. Side dress with the partly finished compost when you runn outta the finished product.

Finished compost aught to have numbers like 1-1-1 or 2-2-2 and should not be able to burn your plants.

Fresh manures from critters that don't make tidy little bullets like (rabbit, goat, camelids) I feel better composting first. This runs really true with chicken-pig manures. They are just too--phew and hot!

I would not add humanure dog or cat even to a compost, and never direct to feild.

There is probably better science on SCM site than my 'by guess or by gosh' rules o thumb. There are links to that site here on TV.