YES. You are Obsessive/ComPOSTive. Seek professional help ASAP.

But why is all this material in your SHED instead of the compost pile?

As long as you are not over harvesting my route I see nothing wrong with what you are doing. If you have the space to stockpile the materials keep stockpiling and composting. I use a lot of starbucks and leaves. Next week I will be spending a week at a house on Padre Island.

Guess what will happen to all the fish scrap and sargassum and jelly fish and crab and shrimp waste I come across? My neighbors will be glad I have a lot of leaves when I get home!

To this obsessed gardener, you are simply uhmm competition. And yes, to me you are normal. All the people throwing stuff like this into a landfill are crazy!

Any obessive aspect is in actually *saving* these things. You should be *using* them. What's the point in having three years' worth of leaves and going out to get more? Go out to get greens, mix them with your old leaves and get the piles going to make compost! Then you can "save" the ones you're collecting now and mix them with greens through the next season - the idea is that the "saved" browns should be just about GONE by the time next leaf season comes around. And the UCGs should be used as you collect them - mixed into piles with leaves, or sprinkled on your lawn or garden directly.

Maybe a trip to Obsessive/ComPOSTive Rehab is in order. Seems to work for the upstanding citizens of Hollywood. Intensive therapy and a 12 step program designed just for us. I really hate it when I hear of those poor junkies that have to resort to violence or robbery to steal egg shells at gunpoint from restaurants and bakeries just to get a "fix".
Seriously though, why not put all that material you have to work? How much good is it doing in your shed?
"If you are sleeping with you pitchfork, you may have a problem".

you are simply uhmm competition.
:)

I agree that the stockpiling is strange, even anti-compost-wacko-behaviour. Those leaves and grounds might as well be beer can fliptops or matchboxes or designer shoes. I saw something about this on Oprah once (purely by chance - I was trying to find the Obsessive Compulsive Composting channel). If you have no use for them why not give them away to someone who does?

Confession time - I will admit that, even though I got all the chopped leaves I could use delivered to me this fall, I still can't drive by a pile of OPBL without getting that feeling that I should stop & pick them up. So far, I've managed to successfully fight the urge, but it IS a fight.

If it makes you feel any better, you could be like me...

I live in an apartment, so have no place for a pile. Yet I freeze more scraps than my worms can handle, and now I'm driving around with 4 bags of leaves that I took in my car because I don't know where to put them where my landlord won't get mad at me for making it look "trashy."

hehehehe

I also save all my kitchen waste beyond what the worms deal with... it's freezing outside so it stays nice and frozen in a cardboard box on my porch. I really SHOULD get a trashcan or something to start composting... lol

Logic dictates... Aw heck! To each his/her own! We all do things that others think are strange/compulsive/habitual/addictive. You're not harming anyone... are you?

Do you have plans for those leaves and grounds? This is a good time of year to mix them together and layer them on all your garden beds. (Actually, any time of year is a good time.) Or is your garden soil already perfect, well-fed, and in no need of mulch (hard to imagine)?

I deal with my excess by piling up browns in my garden paths. In a year, I can sift them if I need compost or potting material, or else use them as browns for the bins. Or leave them.

I started composting last Spring so this is my first year collecting leaves. I've filled my compost bin and have some bags in waiting. A backload from 3 years ago does seem strange though.
Time for you to build another compost bin and get some rotten produce from a local grocery store. Get that organic matter in the ground where it belongs.

pete

Well, Ive read that it can take 3 years for a bag of leaves to turn to leaf mold, so if that's why you're doing it .... ok.

Otherwise, GET THOSE LEAVES ON THE GROUND!!! I brought in at least 100 bags of leaves and want more now cuz those are settling. Leaf season is over here tho. so I gotta wait.

:)

Skipp,
You have a problem and you need to share those goodies if you aren't going to use them! Did my mind trick to get those UCG and chopped leaves into MY compost heap work? ;-)

Pam

Thanks everyone for the feedback. I let my family read the responses. They just don't get it...until harvest time. I plan to use all the leaves but I have a small composting operation that supports 3-3x11 beds in a suburban backyard, which requires me to store up the bagged leaves.

I'm still puzzled why you'd post a question to *this* forum asking about normal behavior. If you've read many posts, you have to realize that we have a warped view of what constitutes normal. At one time, I was packing bags of UCG in my luggage and flying across the country. And there are things I read here that I wouldn't do.

I'm not so sure I'd take an endorsement of your activities by this forum as evidence that you're normal.

I just started composting, and now I have to change Starbucks because I've been picking up grinds there every day this week. What can I say- I have a lot of leaves. My poor kids are starting to think it's normal to go through the Starbucks drivethrough for bags of grinds instead of cups of coffee.

I'm dying for green stuff. I think my grocery store run today may include a talk with the produce manager about taking home some rotten lettuce.

Esther--I don't see a need to change Starbucks. You're helping them out and saving them money by taking what would otherwise be garbage that has to be hauled off.

Skipp, I'm relieved to read your plan. Tiffy's question - "You're not harming anyone... are you?" reminded me of a thread here a long time ago in which somebody proposed writing a compost murder mystery. Disposing of the body in the pile was obvious. Finding the perfect compostable murder weapon took up most of the discussion.

Paul--I don't remember reading that thread, so maybe it was before my time. Apparently, though, somebody who writes for CSI read the thread. There was an episode where somebody used a big chipper/shredder, I think at a school. The next day, there was a thread here with the subject line "Composting newbies" and I was tempted to suggest the use of a large chipper/shredder (as seen on TV).

Bpgreen, you are a FOOL!

You don't compost the newbies here, they are part of the SOLUTION!

The people you want to compost are the people who think you are a mental defective for collecting compost ingredients, namely, relatives. Flesh is a good source of nitrogen (try to keep the flies down -- use lots of shredded leaves or straw), bones are a good source of phosphorus (burn them to get rid of the bulk).

Sue

Ok Sue, looks like you've thought this out too deeply. A fan of "Fargo" are you? ;-)

tj

Bpgreen, I've been trying to remember who it was, and think it was Evelyn. Maybe she moved away to that other site.

Come to think of it, this *is* a funny place to ask if your behavior is normal...

but "normal" is such a fluid concept.

It has more to do with the group you're in than with a rigid yardstick of behavior.

In Tahiti, it's normal to go barefoot.
In Alaska...probly not.

Maybe we could make up a test.

Do you dream about the luxurious smell of finished compost?

Do you choose your clothes based on their future compostability?

Do family members offer to bring you a take-out order rather than sitting with you in a fast-food place because they know you'll pick up every napkin & tray liner on everybody's tray & take it home with you? even though people in the restaurant are watching?

Do your friends think it's a hoot to have drinks with you because you take not only their cocktail napkins but their leftover lemons, cherries, limes, & coasters?

Do you go out at night with a flashlight to check your compost? (this was a true story, reported on this forum!)

Do you think a load of manure is a lovely Christmas/birthday/Valentine's Day/anniversary present?

If you answered "yes" to all the above, then you are perfectly normal!

(in this group)

Sylviatexas,

"... luxurious smell of finished compost." :O) I like!

Hi, With a building full of bags of leaves, why not just hinge the roof, remove the bags and shovel the good stuff out the door when it's time. Removing the bags would also leave room to shovel more leaves in through the hinged roof. Doesn't sound like the shed is being used for much else, so could work as a giant compost bin. That sounds perfectly normal to me, lol. Linda