I have the same problem. My daughter from Wichita told me to go to ?? city or county & after storms they cut trees and you can get that for muching, I just laughed and said you mean you want this 80 year old to go showel that onto ones truck or whateve[which I don't have] bring it home & showel it off. She lives about 3 hr drive from me so she cant do it. That is what she has to do when she gets hers Sometimes I wonder how my kids think

How about straw? I buy it at a local garden center/nursery for $7/bale. A bale of straw goes a long way.

Also, have you asked your neighbors for their fall leaves? A couple of my neighbors deliver their leaves to me regularly each fall. And I go out on garbage night in fall and collect bagged leaves in my little Honda Civic. Can't fit much into that little car at once but after several weeks they do add up.

Karen

Paying $7 for one bail of hay is silly. I also steal leaves from my neighbor's curb. For me it starts in December, when the deciduous leaves have all fallen, and people rake and bag to their hearts content. In December, I get all the leaves that I need for a year, including the fall pumpkins to fill my piles. In my neighborhood, this cycle of raking and bagging continues through April, thanks to an abundance of live oaks that drop their leaves in March. Then for the rest of the year, no more browns until December again. But my greens are few, mostly kitchen scraps, yard weeds and clippings. All of my lawn clippings are mulched back into the yard.

try an ad on craiglist in the farm/garden page for moldy hay

Takadi, you might be able to get loads of leaves delivered by a local landscaping company. I have the exact opposite problem as you (not enough greens), so I was talking with the guy who helps with my yard just last week, telling him all about my composting strategy for the year, and complaining about not having enough greens, and he offered to deliver "as many grass clippings as [I] want from other people's yards" this year. His company has to pay $2 per square yard to dump the grass clippings, so he's saving money and I'm making out like a bandit! While I keep all of the leaves that fall on my property (hence, the abundance of browns here), I'm sure there are customers who cannot store or don't want their leaves, which the landscaping company has to haul away and pay to place somewhere. So you might score with a couple of calls to landscaping companies (at least in the fall). Just another idea from a compost newbie, but already a compost junkie! :)

I don't think buying a few bales of straw is silly. I use it as mulch, as a component in lasagna beds, and as a carbon source for my compost. I do collect lots of leaves but there are only so many I can haul in a Honda or store in my suburban yard.

We all have different different circumstances dogwind. Maybe some of us think you're silly- a gardener who lacks greens. No such problem here, so I guess that makes you silly.

Karen

Watch.
Watch for the day the bags of leaves disappear from your neighbors curb. That is the day the yard waste is removed.
You stop the truck next time & ask the driver to dump the leaves in your back yard.
You are at work when the truck comes by, then call the city or stay home one day.
I stopped to get bags of leaves & a man walked up & ask what I was doing?
I told him, I was going to mulch my tomatoes with them. He said come by every two week & I could get that many leaves again.
I think I will take him some tomatoes & peppers.
Next year he will be calling me to come get his leaves.

I'll give my local landscaping and yard waste disposal company a call, but I am adamant about not hunting down people, knocking on doors, chasing trucks or what not. Those are exactly the reasons why I hate gathering browns.

Shredded junk mail is the primary brown component of my compost pile.

I drop my papers off at the school dumpster which collects papers, books and mail. If there is a bag of finely-shredded paper on top, I take it home(my shredder is not a cross-cut model).

But leaves are my favorite brown. Some of the neighbors drag the bags over to my yard. Last fall a guy doing yard work for pay was happy to pitch his full load of leaves on my driveway. He was planning to pay a $25 dump fee at some drop off site.

There used to be a guy on the block who finely shredded his leaves, then placed them out at the curb. He was my favorite neighbor. I never asked why he bothered to shred the leaves first if he was pitching them, I didn't want him to think about it too hard. Probably had a shredder and liked to use it once a year.

I have not used very much sawdust, but it often has a high C:N ratio. You may prefer small wood chips with lower C:N ratio of fresh cut trees.

Newspaper and cardboard as well as junk mail all make great browns. I'm sure you can find a paperboy who'll drop off any extras, or yesterday's papers from the machines, or ask your neighbors to save their papers, shred papers by hand and you'll have all the browns you need.

Browns are my problem too. I live in the woods, but all of the leaf litter around my area is evergreen oak (thick waxy leaves), small twigs, and pine needles. I threw caution to the wind last summer and tried using that for browns (okay I was desperate) and the resulting compost is basically stinky brown goo with leaves, acorns, and twigs in it. Failure.

I also try shredding all the papers my kids bring home from school, but there's just not enough. I make about a gallon of greens a week and I can't find enough browns to match.

I'll see what craigslist has, but at this point I might need to consider vermicomposting. I'm going on year two of stinky brown goo because I just cant find the carbons to balance my compost.

I have mostly leaves. I do kitchen compost in a separate pile. I have HUGE amounts of leaves. About 30 garbage pails worth every year. Those leaves are mostly Red Oak, with some Cottonwood and Cedar Elm. They compost OK with virtually no added "green" stuff". I have a small pile now that is running 50C. The trick is to shred the leaves well. If you don't, the greens will turn into stinky brown goo and the leaves will just sit there.

Evergreen oak? You mean live oak? What are those leaves doing on the ground?

I wish you lived closer(midlands of S.C.), we have two coffee processing plant here.

The coffee beans are roasted & shed skin(CHAFF) like peanuts, which is very flammable.The chaff is wet so it will not combust.

You get wet organic matter that is hot & fine like sawdust, it will decompose in about 6-8 weeks. But I till it in to the garden as soon as I get it.

Daninthedirt - Yes, canyon live oak. They're green all year round and drop their leaves all year round as well. I call them "yard herpes..."

Hmmm. Live oak around here just keeps their leaves. But are you shredding the leaves? If you don't they won't compost well.

Surely they drop their leaves sometime, Dan? Evergreens still shed, even if not all at once.

@Armoured - I had no idea such a thing existed. I spent $100 on this neat tumbling composter a few years back and I really want to make it work. Mostly because I don't have the space for the trenching - any space I do have is being used for growing things. Wonder if I can trench the greens in the spot I normally grow and let nature do the rest?

@Daninthedirt - I don't have a way to shred the leaves. If I even suggest to my husband that I spend more money on this gardening stuff to buy a shredder he'll probably cut up my card, haha! I have too many hobbies that demand a fair amount of money, so I try to keep everything on the cheap now.

Checked craigslist and didn't find anyone giving away browns. Did find someone selling good looking compost, though. Figures.

I can see how a mixture of pine needles, twigs and very waxy oak leaves will not compost very fast. A shredder would help a lot with that. They even make small electric ones now.

Other than that I have not had problems composting leaves. Mine are a mixture of silver maple, cottonwood, oak, redbud, locust, linden, walnut and a couple others so there is a good mix. Most all of these except for the oak are not waxy and tough and they compost just fine. I can even make leaf mould with 100% leaves although it takes 2 seasons. I blend most of them with greens and they compost nicely in a few months.

I can see how a mixture of pine needles, twigs and very waxy oak leaves will not compost very fast. A shredder would help a lot with that. They even make small electric ones now.

Other than that I have not had problems composting leaves. Mine are a mixture of silver maple, cottonwood, oak, redbud, locust, linden, walnut and a couple others so there is a good mix. Most all of these except for the oak are not waxy and tough and they compost just fine. I can even make leaf mould with 100% leaves although it takes 2 seasons. I blend most of them with greens and they compost nicely in a few months.

I just searched Amazon for a good shredder, and it looks like they either mulch leaves and paper (don't even think about twigs and acorns), or just twigs (leaves get ignored, acorns clog machine.) Not sure I can win this one, might have to start calling landscaping companies and seeing if I can help myself to their dump sites.

I just make a pile of leaves, and run my power mower over it. It scatters a lot of cut/uncut debris, so you just rake it back in to a pile and do it again. Takes two or three iterations to get it all well shredded. Works great. I guess if you use a bag with your mower, it's just a matter of emptying the bag into a pile. I'd never need a shredder, and mower is handy becuase when you're done with it, you just wheel it away. I mow acorns as well, and manage to cut up a lot of them. Acorns are a powerful "green". Lots of protein and nitrogen.

Unshredded waxy leaves won't compost. The waxy coating will prevent the leaves from getting well saturated with water.

@miztaryn, perhaps others could respond on trench composting in tight garden spot. I've not been that tight on space. I'm sure it's possible with judicious spacing and timing, and also depending what plants nearby. My neighbours use trench composting for their main, very heavily used and tightly packed garden at the end of every season - everything from kitchen, the garden, whatever else is around gets turned under for the winter.

@Daninthedirt - The mower is a great idea. Too bad I've never owned a mower because I've never had a lawn here in the mountains, haha

@Armoured - trench composting seems like the way to go. I wonder how long the process takes? Our winters are short here, I'd have to get creative.

Either case, I may end up having to buy straw. Hopefully it's not outrageously expensive!

I honestly don't know how long it takes. Mostly I think it doesn't matter - more problematic if you're growing carrots or some other root vegetable, but I suspect many other plants would tolerate. As long as not outrageous. Here's a link, perhaps googling will turn up what you need.

https://www.thespruce.com/why-you-should-compost-in-trenches-2539479

There are also threads in here - search and find what you need.

http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/1666100/trench-compost-questions

Whereabouts are you located? Some cities have yard waste/mulch sites. I live in a town of 100,000 and we have two of them, where residents can dump any kind of yard waste and pick up all the free shredded mulch they want. It can be a gold mine for leaves and other materials.

Trench composting works!

https://www.redwormcomposting.com/?s=Trench+composting

Yes, trench composting works, but it's used for a different purpose than pile composting. The latter is used to create a heap of compost that you can do different things with. Move it here, there, and everywhere. I believe that trench composting is where you bury the debris in your garden bed and just leave it ... forever. It breaks down underground and very gradually amends the surrounding soil. So it depends what you want to get out of it. I have to suspect that trench composting takes a while for the debris to break down completely because it isn't very aerobic, and there is no mixing going on. So the bacteria and fungi have to migrate from one piece of debris to the other, instead of getting moved around by stirring.

Not in my case, The trench pile gets bacteria from all sides & is not as big as an above ground pile. I shred any large debris, spread it out 12 inches wide X 432 inches long.

I also add a small amount of finished compost on top to prime the trench pile.

There is some evidence that the decomposition process itself creates a lot of soil fertility, so trench composting may actually be more beneficial to plants than composting somewhere else and adding the compost to the soil. For one thing, compost piles can offgas some nitrogen, but if decomposition is underground, the overlying soil captures it. Massive microbial action also plays a role in making nutrients available.

@Toxcrusadr - a tiny mountain town in California. Our entire county (spanning 15+ cities) has a population of less than 55k. Resources here are usually pooled around Walmart...

This trench composting thing really has me thinking. In the off season, I could trench between/around my veggie rows and toss my greens in those trenches. In the summer time I can buy some straw and compost in my tumbler like normal while the trench compost works its magic.

I'm really glad I came here, you guys are a wealth of ideas and information.

@miztaryn - more or less what I was thinking in your case. Just use trench when convenient, to dispose of extra kitchen stuff, and balance for available browns. You can start simple and just dig some short trenches and see how it works. You don't have to do just one or the other, mix and match, whatever works. As with anything, if you start modest and see how it goes and experiment, you're less likely to be frustrated. You can probably do a bit of trench / hole composting from time to time during the on-season too by careful placement in your garden.

But what trench composting doesn't do is to increase soil tilth, friablility, and moisture retention NOW. The stuff just sits there for a while. As a near-term beneficial, that's precisely what composting in piles (or pits) does for you. It produces an amendment that's good for the soil as soon as it is applied. Yes, to some extent the decomposition process itself benefits soil. The decomposition of anything (including compost) continues in the soil, and it continues with bacteria and fungi. But digging finished compost into the soil will bring that bacteria.

So trench composting is an investment that really only pays off in the long term. That being said, in trench composting, you sorta can't go wrong. Don't worry about greens and browns. Just dump organics in.

Do it with money. It's worth a fee to have an outfit deliver maybe 5 yards of something appropriate. Presumably you look at their stuff first.

OP has a considerable need, isn't young, doesn't have a truck and doesn't have ready access to a good source.

Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.