Gave my Compost a new Home
Old
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New
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The size of the worms at or near the bottom were incredible, sharpie marker thick and atleast 10 inches long.

I took my neighbor's prunings and ours and put them through the chipper. We had lots of bones, chicken, pork chop and steak in the freezer that I had failed to burn in the wood stove this past spring that my wife decided needed to go. They were frozen solid so when I put them in the chipper, they were completely smashed. I mixed them with the chipped prunings and a neighbor's lawn cuttings yesterday and wow, my pile is really cooking now. I've hot composted for years but never had a pile cook at almost 165 degrees. Mine have normally cooked along at temps between 140 and 150. I'm not sure why it's cooking so much hotter than normal but it's pretty "cool" even if my wife doesn't find it so exciting.

My cousin donated:
a cucumber, a zuchinni and some old green beans
I contributed coffee grounds and an egg shell from breakfast.

Started a new pile this weekend. Stands to be pretty blazing hot. Started with a wheelbarrow or two of horse manure and urine-soaked pine shaving bedding. Then DW cleaned out the chicken coop, so I got 3.5 wheelbarrows of pine shavings mixed with chicken manure and craft paper from the roosts caked with more manure. 4 bags of lawn clippings with lots of brown leaves mixed in, greens from two batches of beets I cooked and pickled, some cut up vines from a squash plant I had to prune back, finished off with two more wheelbarrows full of horse manure and bedding. Oh yes, and the weekly pail of kitchen scraps. Mixed up good and watered down, this one will cook fast!

For the first time in about 15 years my compost is too wet so I added lots of torn up newspaper. It's a newish pile, started when we moved last September, and I guess it got overloaded with very wet kitchen scraps over the winter. I looked at my dad's over the weekend (he is my compost protege) and his is lovely and ready, mine is oozing stuff and it seems like it's taking forever to make it right.

I have been to Edisto Beach,S.C. & just got back.
I have vegetables peelings, coffee & tea grounds & some leaves from a flower bed, Raspberry clippings.
My table grape are ripe, so I should have some seeds & stems from them.

Kitchen scraps, of course.

And sheep's wool, as I'm teaching myself to spin. I had hope that the birds would take some of this to make nests, so I put my wool scraps in a suet feeder over the winter. Not so much as a hair out of place. Oh well, compost it is.

I shredded a few things in the yard with the mower.

I also added some filtered beer last night :-)

How would leftover yarn be? Not synthetic, but natural fiber stuff. I'm always cutting off bits and pieces from my creations.

5 # of shrimp shells
1 gallon of awful kimchi
Last bag of fall leaves

Shrimp shells, crab shells, fish bones, moldy bread, stinky stuff from the refrigerator, and a hard yellow squash.

Two very drowned (and decomposing) chipmunks who had the misfortune to fall into a bucket of alfalfa tea that I had neglected to cover... and the usual kitchen scraps.

This week I fed the compost pile 10 summer squash plants. a few small rotten melons and a cucumber plant along with some large over ripe cucumbers.

Hey, so I am cleaning out my moms pantry for her. She has a ton of old spices that expired years ago. I want to know if its ok to put in my compost, or will it mess it up?

I don't see why spices wouldn't be fine to add to a compost pile, so long as they don't have salt in them.

deposited two 5-gallon buckets of weeds into my savings account/compost pile

A gallon or so of cherry pits/skins from the syrup making operation, watermelon halves from the annual sibling watermelon eating contest (DD13 stomped the competition), the usual array of veggie/fruit peels, pits, crusts, and skins accumulating on a mid-summers day, and to top it all off, about 3 cubic yards of grass clippings.

(Do I love my riding mower that catches all the clippings, or what? )

3 foot long gladiolas past their prime
UCG, peelings, etc regular stuff
watermelon rinds
dry leaves from the crocosmia that have finally completely gone brown

Switched the old pile into the other hole, to finish, and started a new one in the first hole. Trenched half finished compost straight down the middle of the veggie garden has sunk into a little groove. Pile of euc leaves and ironwood needles and random brush has gone way down and come the fall rains it will get spread around as mulch, but not yet.
Would give my eye teeth for a chipper/shredder, a mower or anything like that. Have checked, no one has one to borrow. All is done by my own two hands. One day........!

Batya, keep looking for a chipper/shredder. For a number of years, my dear wife has insisted we give each other anniversary presents that focus on my garden (greenhouse, rototiller, chipper, rain barrels, etc). I love them all but especially that chipper. I use it to chip all our bush brush and that of our neighbors and to shred a large number of bags of leaves in the fall. Add to that mix, lots of horse manure, lawn clippings, most of our paper towels, and our kitchen waste and the compost generated from all this organic matter is simply amazing.

the weekly collection in our step on trash can included:

hair from hubby's monthly hair cut (usually goes out near roses to scare off the deer... only partially successful)
dustpan contents (mostly hair, fir needles, & dirt)
dryer lint from cotton towels, shirts, & jeans
various fruit & vegetable scraps w/ peels
used coffee grounds & filters

assorted used papers torn into smaller pieces...
paper sacks from grocery & flour
facial tissues & toilet paper rolls from restroom
used paper napkins
household scrap paper from junkmail, notes, pencil drawings, etc.

Today's feast included:

kitty claw clippings
a little bit of blood-
mine not cat's, but it was a near thing
mushy strawberries
trimmings from squash, tomatoes, potatoes, & onions
eggshells
coffee grounds/filters/cold coffee
tea bags
torn-up junk mail & newspaper

besides the kitchen scraps i've deposited tomato vines and shrimp hulls from 2 lbs gulf shrimp. No rain! and over 20 consecutive days of 100+ degree weather. The piles have been very dry lately.

Added three busted bags of mushroom compost, several big bags of coffee grounds and filters to my latest pile which is mostly shredded leaves and grass clippings. Hoping it will be ready to spread on my flower gardens this fall.

Rosie, Sugar Hill, GA

is a plastic cylinder container with holes on the bottom sides ok for making compost?? It is approximately 25 gallons. If acceptable, how long would it take?