No compost does not have to get hot. Cold composting is practiced by many with excellent results. Many of us have both cold and hot compost piles going. Cold composting just takes longer but the end result is just as good.

You haven't "ruined" your pile. It likely just needs to be balanced a bit better and perhaps a bit bigger - size does matter. ;) The smell was from an excess of nitrogens and too little carbons. More dead leaves or some straw or cardboard would have quickly eliminated the odor. So if you have access to more grass clippings, by all means take them. Just make sure to add some dry carbons (browns) at the same time. ;)

Dave

Thanks Dave! I'll add some more leaves and maybe some shredded cardboard. I am really enjoy the idea of composting and so maybe I'll augment my pile! Thanks again.

Janet

I'm still new at this myself, Janet -- finding that balance between low-carbon/nitrogen-rich green stuff (kitchen scraps, recently living leaves, weeds) and higher-carbon brown stuff (autumn leaves, straw, cardboard) is still escaping me.

this weekend, I had a moisture issue coupled with too many greens added at the same time -- talk about stinky and slimy and unappealing! By yesterday evening, I'd added four or five office cans of shredded paper. I'd add a can, stir things around -- move everything to the left or right -- and eventually balanced everything out.

I probably should have wet the paper some, but since I was trying to correct for too much moisture, I'm going to wait a few days. At least, I intend to wait a few days. I get antsy sometimes. :)

We've "lazy composted" for many years and never balanced anything or turned it either. Just chucked our daily kitchen compost in the bin and once a year took the black soil from the bottom of the pile. I had NEVER smelled anything from our compost bin but perhaps we were lucky or my sense of smell is off (not true, it's very good).

Now that I've found this forum I've been playing with compost more and made a huge boo-boo which stunk to high heaven!!! Added more wood shavings and it's no longer stinky. However it only heated for a time and isn't anymore. I'm turning, adding UCG, wetting it, and it will eventually be compost. I'm being patient.:)

What kind of odor did you have? If one largely of Ammonia the grass clippings made up too much of the pile and what you smelled was Nitrogen gassing off to the atmosphere, a loss of nutrients. If the odor was putrid then your compost was too wet and that is why it would not heat up, not necessarily because you needed more grass clippings.

How about the smell of methane? I went out to turn my pile for the first time this spring and at one point there was such a stench I had to ask my husband (who was working nearby) if he had, er, passed gas! Since he said no, I assumed I had hit a patch of all nitrogen.

"How about the smell of methane?"

I think methane is a sign of anaerobic decomposition.

Texjen, composting is nothing but causing material to break down. Different materials break down in different ways and in different time.
Rust, the breaking down of metal caused by moisture and oxygen is nevertheless a type of composting.
Grass clippings, because they contain all the fertilizer you put into your lawn is a valuable addition to any compost pile.

To better understand why nitrogen is so valuable in the composting process, do a Google search on "about nitrogen".

Grass clippings, to be sure, because of their size, breaks down well. But, too much of anything is too much. When you overload the pile with one material, it can stop or slow down the breaking down of other material.

Without measuring each additions, just use common sense in adding what is called "greens"....things like grass, straw, kitchen scraps, coffee grounds (and tea leaves) and eggshells are examples. Think organic material--they're greens. Anything that is natural or comes from natural materials are such green examples.

Browns come from inorganic materials. Your lawn fertilizer is inorganic but is a valuable way to speed up break down of the pile because as things break down, nitrogen is used up. Throw a cup or two of lawn fertilizer --one with a high nitrogen content occasionally to supplant what the pile has used to effect breakdown already done.
Hence the value of grass clippings.

Compost piles must be kept damp....never wet to the point of being soggy. That slows down the breakdown.
Grass clippings, as a layer on top, for a day or so, will help heat up the layers below. But then it should be turned over.
Compost piles should be turned on a regular basis to ingest oxygen into the pile.

But then, too much nitrogen is just as bad as too little.
Leaves, well chewed up, because they are high in carbon content, will use the nitogen to effect their breakdown rather quickly.

If your pile stinks, its usually because of poor aeration.
Turn it over and make sure its not too wet.

Don't trust your compost will take the place of fertilizers.
While compost is a valuable soil amendment, it is not trustworthy to contain the valuable elements nitrogen, phosphurus and potassium (potash) that is needed for proper plant health.
Compost wont have the added trace elements that is so necessary for good plant health.
Fertilizers, the ones we buy in bags, and spread on the lawns and gardens in the spring, do contain such trace elements.

Compost can often fill in the blanks and help the soil bacteria boost root development. But, since it takes a lot more than just good roots to make good plants, and becaue each compost pile is different from yours, to mine, to the guy around the corner and the guy across the nation.
What goes in, counts for what comes out.

"Browns come from inorganic materials. "

Usually, the use of the term "Brown' denotes something that has more carbon in relation to nitrogen than the 30:1 ratio that is considered ideal for composting. fall leaves, sawdust, etc are all organic, and also all considered browns.

Follow-up to original post:

Well I left the stinkyish (is that a word?)grass on the pile a couple of days and then I went ahead and turned the pile. What I was surprised and delighted to see was that the pile had heated up much more and that the bottom 2/3 of the pile was a deep brown and very rich looking. Some stems and recognized veggies still were mixed in. I am officially addicted to composting.
BTW, the original crazy smell of the grass was no longer so strong and the rest of the pile doesn't smell at all (just smells like forest).
Now I just need to learn when it's "finished". Is there such a thing? I'll read through the archives...thanks for the all great guidance. Composting ROCKS!!

Janet

Methane would be an indication of anaerobic ( in the absence of air) digestion. it is a gas that is desireable in some composting, closed container, processes where that gas is captured and used to produce electricity or for heat or cooking. But it is not a desireable by product of open air composting because that indicates the compost is simply too wet to properly digest.

Compost is easy or hard, depending on how you want it to be.
Many of us here are compost whackos and proud of it.

I disagree that compost is not as good as the fertilizer one buys for their lawn. Many fertilizers only contain the big three Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and potassium and little/no secondary or trace elements. However, compost using leaves and grass clippings and sawdust and kitchen scraps and all sorts of other things will likely contain more widely varied nutrients than the simple bag of 6-6-6 fertilizer.
Now one might argue that they tested this and placed some of their first year fertilizer on a garden bed and used fertilizer on the other garden bed and the fertilized garden bed grew bigger tomatoes. The reason, it takes time and patients to build up healthy soil. Compost is slow release nutrients and soil isn't built in one season.

I have seen dramatic improvements in my soil and gardening over the past year and a half in my new house. Each season of improving my soil and the plants seem to be growing better and better.

Here is a link that might be useful: TCLynx