That depends on what you have available, but any high Nitrogen material can work. Animal manures, Blood Meal, Urea, most any lawn fertilizer, would all be sources of N that would keep the bacteria working on digesting the high Carbon materials.

Are you putting all your kitchen scraps in the compost? It's not a large volume at one time, but it's constant all year long.

Here are a few ideas:

I grow winter rye in my raised beds to keep the weeds out during the winter. You could easily grow it for composting purposes.

Oak leaves will also hot compost if the pile is big enough or if you add kitchen scraps.

Never done it myself, but I've heard a lot of people get used coffee grounds from coffee shops and compost those.

If you have any friends that home brew, you can get their waste. If your pile is small enough and you drink enough of you friends home brews you could pee on the pile. There are several threads about peeing on your pile.

And if all that doesn't work, you may have to go down to the store and buy a 10 lb bag of Patience. Sometimes, you just have to wait. :-]

tox
what's it going for in your neck of the woods cause patience is a scarce commodity here in NY.

The only way I've ever been able to hot compost in the winter in Maine is in my chicken house. My outdoor bins all freeze regardless of the ingredients. It would take an awfully large pile not to freeze, I think.

Listen, I know a guy on the East Side. I can fix you up, pal, know what I'm sayin?

While I have had compost piles freeeze up during the winter most often that was because there was too much moisture in the mix. When that compost pile went into the depths of winter with a good mix of Carbon to Nitrogen and just the right amount of moisture the bacteria that digest that material stayed acive enough to generate enough heat to keep the pile from freezing.
Although, if your air temperatures drop below 0 for a sustained time that probably would slow the bacteria enough so the pile could freeeze no matter what.

I use used coffee grounds in winter composting when grass is not available. Grounds have a couple of drawbacks -- often too much moisture which allows freezing, and the weight can compact the pile more than I like. But the choices are limited and grounds are always available.

I like low piles, and find that four diameters (square and round) work very well.

Freezing can be a problem, but as was suggested above, too much moisture is often the problem. I use a cover over the pile as needed.

Throw your non-cleaner contaminated paper towels in with your kitchen scraps that you collect inside a lidded bin with a paper bag inside. This will add the browns you need as kitchen scraps are very high in nitrogen. It will also help to absorb the liquids that accumulate. The more bags you can add to the compost pile, the higher the chances you have of them heating up.

Having a layer of leaves over your pile will act like insulation and help trap pockets of temperature batteries that protect from wind. Dig a small hole in your compost, throw your bags inside, and cover back up.

Putting a tarp over your pile helps a lot too. 4 mil plastic sheeting is great if your pile isnt shaded. The UV rays will pass thru the sheeting and trap the heat during cold days.

Remember, just because there is snow on it, doesnt mean its frozen. At some point in time, the process may stop until a thaw, but you should still try to feed your pile just the same.

HUH??????

I have a mower with a bag.

I try to save some of my grass clippings in the summer so I will have something to add to my leaves in the fall.

In the fall, I save some bags of leaves so I will have some browns to add to my grass clippings in the spring.

Program works pretty good for me.

Sunnydog1994, I'm sure you won't have a problem hot composting in your climate. You might have to play around with the ingredients - it's difficult to say as your description of "yard waste" is pretty generic. If you need more 'greens' you could eat more veggies and fruit for the peels, etc. (and also for your health). Or scrounge veggie waste from friends, relatives, or the nearest grocery store (if they will provide) and used coffee grounds from any source. Every little bit helps. You can also buy alfalfa pellets, various seed meals, or nitrogen fertilizer if necessary. Keep in mind that the composting process can be different for each of us depending on so many factors. Try different ideas to see what works and don't get discouraged when some don't work for you.

The following only for others in cold climates... Whenever threads on this topic appear I want to invite some of the people who think anyone can compost in any temperature to visit this northern climate. Here in zone 3 which is also a dry area (20" precipitation yearly) it's not something that's happening. There's snow on top of my pile right now and more coming. Turning or adding water at -40 (C or F - take your pic, they're the same at that temp) would be interesting to say the least. Zero F is *only* -17.77C which might be a reasonably balmy day in the winter here! Of course we're into global warming and the winters aren't as cold as they were. Still, I'm not attempting to run a hot pile, just collect all the kitchen waste in my winter compost bin which by late March or early April I'll layer with the pile I started in the fall and get it going. It all eventually becomes compost, and I've got a ton of patience. Not really but if I say it enough it might be true! Never give up, composting is worth any effort but don't stress about the impossible.

Or maybe I should throw an electric blanket over the pile! ;D LOL

OTOH, if you can't garden in winter anyway, what's the rush to make hot compost?

Mine is hot in the fall when I make big piles with the fall cleanup stuff, but it cools off during winter. Turn it once in early spring when it gets freaky warm one day, and it's ready by gardening time. JMHO.

No rush on my part Tox, but I do tire of certain people implying that a hot compost pile can be maintained at any temperature. There are often new posters who may feel they have 'failed' somehow and that composting is too much work. IMO composting (and gardening) should be made as easy and realistic as possible and new gardeners made aware of what is possible and what is not.

My horse manure/sawdust/kitchen scraps pile didn't get enough water earlier this fall as the hoses have to be put away when we get frost. Today after lunch I had to scrape the snow and ice off to bury my kitchen scraps. I add some water with the scraps each day but it's not enough so it likely won't heat til spring. Just reality here in the north. My current pile will be ready by June.

Sunnydog: North Carolina gets cooler than I do but I've been able to sustain get a not-so-hot pile hotter by adding what others have suggested -- mainly chicken manure and/or alfalfa pellets. Turn it a few times over the next few weeks and the leave it alone. It's the rain that's kills the heat though -- washes all that nitrogen right on out. So make sure you keep it LOOSELY covered. One thing that's key to the pile heating up is air. So turning in the 1st month or 3 is key -- unless you set up air pipes to pump the pile with oxygen.

Kevin

1) Have a pile size appropiate for your ingredients. (Wood chips as main brown need a larger pile size when compare to shredded leaves).

2) Insulate your pile (works better for square one) with bales of straw or other material.

3) Line outside of pile with landscape fabric, burlap, or other material.

4) Dig down a foot or so, making the pile larger and partly insulated while not much harder to turn.

5) Put scraps, fish, and other possibly problematic ingredients in core.

Coffee grounds are free. I've found that the expresso grounds that Starbucks likes to give out (maybe I should say USED to like to give out) were not as good as the loose grounds and filters that they just pitch in the trash bin.

The loose grounds have less water so they tend to freeze less in the winter. Plus they don't compress the pile as much. Fresh grass is still my favorite if available.

But I have not used any coffee grounds in years. I compost fall leaves as soon as they fall. A mix of oak, sweet gum, and maples leaves; with a bit of grass included since the mower is used to collect and shred the material. My piles now range from 120 to 140F for a 18" high pile, and would be even hotter if I did not turn them daily. Takes a whole five minutes with a large, open, low, mesh bin. I stick the compost thermometer in each day to keep on top of core temps.

Keep in mind that water has to added frequently with this warm, almost hot temps. And I shred the leaves down in size, just one shredding with a normal mower won't make the pieces small enough to compost fast and hot. When a neighbor mows and bags, I spread this out in a two inch layer and run over it twice more with my side discharge push mower. Not all the leaves have to be the same size. Today I raked up some colorful whole sweet gum leaves and folded them into the top couple of inches of the compost file.

Composting is not rocket science. Just like riding a bike, once you learn you never forget.