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THE COMPOST PILE
Everything you throw away is trying to become dirt. Let it.
Arthur Blevins, backyard composter, 1974 to the present

The Sermon | Browns & Greens | The Pile | Water & Air | What NOT to Put In | My Three-Bin System | Troubleshooting | 1999 Output | When Is It Done?

The Sermon (short version) Every fall, the people on my street rake their leaves into paper bags and put the bags on the curb, and a truck comes and takes them away, and in the spring the same people drive to the garden center and buy bags of compost and bring them home. I have been watching this happen for twenty-five years and I have not gotten used to it. Leaves, grass clippings, coffee grounds, the vegetable peelings, the eggshells, the stuff that goes soft in the crisper drawer: that is not garbage. That is next year's garden, sitting there waiting for you to stop throwing it away. A compost pile turns it into the best soil amendment there is, for free, in your own yard, with no machinery, no chemicals, and no special knowledge beyond what's on this one page. It's the closest thing to magic I know of, except it isn't magic at all, it's bacteria and fungi and worms doing what they've always done, and all you have to do is give them a decent place to do it. I'm Arthur. I'm 58, I've been composting since I bought this house in 1974, and I grow more vegetables on a city lot than most people would believe. My neighbors have gotten used to me. Some of them now bring me their leaves. This is progress. Browns and Greens: the recipe The little creatures that do the work need two things to eat: carbon for energy and nitrogen to build themselves. Compost people talk about this as "browns" and "greens." BROWNS (carbon) - dry, dead, woody GREENS (nitrogen) - fresh, wet, recently alive Dry leaves (the king of browns) Straw Shredded newspaper and plain cardboard (no glossy) Sawdust and wood shavings, in moderation (from untreated wood only) Dried corn stalks, dead plants from the garden Pine needles, a few Paper towels, napkins, egg cartons Grass clippings (the king of greens, but see below) Vegetable and fruit scraps Coffee grounds and the filter, tea bags Fresh weeds (before they set seed) Manure from herbivores: chicken, rabbit, horse, cow Eggshells (crushed; they're really neither, but they go in) Spent flowers, garden trimmings The scientists talk about the carbon-to-nitrogen ratio and say the ideal is somewhere around 25 or 30 parts carbon to one part nitrogen. You are not going to measure this and neither do I. In practice it works out to roughly two or three parts browns to one part greens, by volume. Two buckets of leaves for every bucket of kitchen scraps and grass. If you remember one thing: when in doubt, add leaves. Too many browns and the pile just goes slow. Too many greens and it turns into a slimy, stinking mess (more on that in troubleshooting). This is why I keep a pile of last fall's leaves in a wire bin next to the compost bins, all year long. Every time a bucket of kitchen scraps goes on, a couple of forkfuls of leaves go on top of it. Leaves are the answer to nearly every compost question. The pile: 3 by 3 by 3 A compost pile heats up when it's working (I've measured 150 degrees in the middle of mine with a long thermometer; it steams on a cold morning like a chimney). That heat comes from the bacteria, and the pile has to be big enough to hold it in. The usual figure is a minimum of about 3 feet by 3 feet by 3 feet, a cubic yard. Smaller than that and the outside cools the inside and it just sits there composting slowly and coldly, which does work, it just takes a year instead of a couple of months. Much bigger than about 5 feet across and the middle can't get any air. The heat matters for another reason: a hot pile (above about 130 degrees for a few days) kills most weed seeds and most plant diseases. A cold pile doesn't. So if you're not sure your pile is getting hot, leave out the weeds that have gone to seed and the tomato vines that had blight. You don't need a bin at all; a heap on the ground works. A bin keeps it tidy, keeps the neighbors and the dog out of it, and holds the sides up so it stays tall enough. Wire fencing in a circle, wooden pallets tied at the corners, or the three-bin arrangement I'll describe below. Water and air The bacteria you want are the kind that breathe air, and they need water. So: Moisture: like a wrung-out sponge. Grab a handful from the middle and squeeze. It should feel damp and maybe give up a drop or two, but not stream water. Dry as leaves in a bag: hose it as you turn it. Wet enough to drip: turn it, and add dry browns. A pile under a tarp or a lid stays more even through rain and drought; mine is open, and I just watch it. Air: turn it. A pile that gets no air goes to the other kind of bacteria, the ones that don't need air, and those are the ones that make the smell of a swamp. Turning the pile with a fork (moving the outside to the inside and the inside to the outside) lets air in and mixes the wet with the dry and the fresh with the rotted. The more you turn, the faster it goes. Turned every few days, a good pile can be done in a month or two. Turned once a month, more like three or four. Never turned at all, it'll still get there in a year, and there's no shame in that; I know people who just pile it and wait, and their gardens are fine. But I like turning. It's the best exercise I get and I can see what's happening. Chop it small. Everything rots faster with more surface. I run the lawn mower over the leaves before they go in the bin. Corn stalks get cut into pieces. A whole pumpkin takes all winter; a smashed pumpkin takes a month. What NOT to put in Meat, fish, bones, fat, grease Draws rats, raccoons, the neighbor's dog, and flies, and stinks while it rots. They will compost, eventually, but you do not want to be there for it. Dairy: cheese, milk, butter Same. Smell and animals. Dog and cat waste Can carry parasites and germs that a backyard pile doesn't reliably get hot enough to kill, and this is going on the vegetables. No. Herbivore manure (chicken, rabbit, horse, cow) is a different story and is wonderful; see Nancy's chickens. Diseased plants Blighted tomatoes, mildewed squash. Unless you know your pile runs hot, these go in the trash. Weeds gone to seed; roots of the spreading weeds Bindweed, quackgrass. A cold pile just stores them for you, and you'll spread them all over the garden next spring. Hot pile, fine. Not sure, don't. Coal or charcoal ash Sulfur and worse. Wood ash from the fireplace is all right in small amounts (it's alkaline, so a little), but not the briquettes. Glossy paper, colored inks, anything plastic-coated Newspaper and plain cardboard are fine. The Sunday magazine isn't. Treated or painted wood, sawdust from it The chemicals that keep the wood from rotting will keep your pile from rotting, and worse. Big piles of grass clippings alone Not forbidden, but a warning. Fresh grass by itself packs down into a slimy, airless, ammonia-smelling mat. Mix it with leaves as it goes in, or better, leave the clippings on the lawn where they belong. Lime, "compost starter," miracle powders You don't need them. A shovelful of finished compost or plain garden soil has all the bacteria a new pile could want. Save your money for seeds. My three-bin system I built this in the spring of 1987 and rebuilt the rotted parts in 1996. It's three open-fronted bins in a row, each 3 feet wide, 3 feet deep, and 3 feet high, sharing walls. The frame is 2x4s (the posts were the one place I used treated lumber, set in the ground, and they never touch the compost). The walls are half-inch hardware cloth stapled to the frame, so air gets in all four sides. The fronts are loose 1x6 boards that slide down into slots, so you can pull them out one at a time to get a fork in. The whole thing is 9 feet long and sits along the back fence where it gets some shade. Materials today would run you around $75. The way it works: Bin 1 is the pile being built. Everything new goes here, greens covered with browns, all year long. Bin 2 is the pile that's cooking. When Bin 1 is full, I fork it over into Bin 2 (that's a turn, and it mixes everything). Then Bin 1 starts filling again. Bin 2 gets turned in place (or back and forth with 1 if 1 is empty) every week or two, and watered if it needs it. Bin 3 is finished compost, curing and waiting to be used. When Bin 2 is done, it goes to Bin 3, and Bin 1 moves to Bin 2, and so on around. The wire leaf bin, holding last fall's leaves, is a fourth bin next to them, just a circle of fencing. A three-bin system is not necessary. A single pile is fine. But if you're the kind of person who reads this far down a page about compost, you're going to want three bins eventually, so you might as well build them now. Troubleshooting Problem What's going on Fix Smells like ammonia Too much nitrogen (greens, grass, manure). The extra nitrogen is escaping as ammonia gas, which is a waste of it. Turn it and mix in a lot of browns. Leaves. Always leaves. Smells like rotten eggs or a swamp No air. It's too wet, or packed down, or both, and the wrong bacteria have taken over. Turn it, fluff it, mix in dry browns. If it's soaking, spread it out for a day to dry, then rebuild it. Nothing's happening; it's cold and just sits there Usually too dry, or too much brown and not enough green, or too small a pile. Squeeze test. Water it while turning. Add greens: grass, coffee grounds, a bag of manure from the feed store. Make it bigger. Chop things smaller. It was hot, now it's cooled off, but it's not done Normal. The bacteria ate what was easy and need air and a fresh mix. Turn it. It'll heat up again, a little less each time, until it's finished. Flies Kitchen scraps sitting exposed on top. Bury scraps in the middle of the pile or cover them with leaves every time. Every time. Rats, raccoons, the dog Something in there they want. Usually meat, grease, or bread and cooked food. Stop putting that in. Bury scraps deep, cover with leaves, hardware cloth on the bin, and a lid or a board on top. Big mat of grass in the middle, gray and slimy Grass clippings dumped in a layer. They mat and go airless. Break it up, mix with leaves. Next time, mix as you go, thin layers. White threads or powder all through it That's fungus doing its job, especially on leaves and woody stuff. It's a good sign. Nothing. Say thank you. Full of worms, bugs, pill bugs, centipedes This is a working pile, in the later, cooler stage. Nothing. You're nearly done. The worms will move out on their own when you spread it. 1999 output (so far) I keep a tally on the garage wall in pencil, one mark for every wheelbarrow of finished compost that comes out of Bin 3. A wheelbarrow is about three cubic feet, heaped. When Barrows Went to April 10-11 7 The vegetable beds, an inch or two over everything before planting. This was last fall's leaves and the winter's kitchen scraps. May 22 3 Tomato and pepper holes, the asparagus bed, and two barrows to Mrs. Hardesty across the street for her roses. She brings me leaves now. July 3 4 Sifted fine for the seed beds (fall lettuce, carrots) and side-dressing the corn. Sept. 4 5 Mostly this summer's grass and garden waste. Mulched the strawberries and the garlic bed. Fastest batch of the year; the July heat cooked it in six weeks. Total, 1999 so far 19 About 57 cubic feet, or a little over two cubic yards. From a city lot. Free. Bin 2 is cooking right now with the last of the summer garden, and I expect one more batch out of it in late October before the cold slows everything down. Then the leaves come down and the whole cycle starts over. Last year's total was 22 barrows. If I had the space for a fourth bin I could do 30. My wife says I don't need a fourth bin. My wife is probably right. When is it done? When it's dark brown, crumbly, smells like the floor of the woods after rain, and you can't tell what any of it used to be, except maybe the eggshells and the odd avocado pit (those take forever; I just throw them back in). It should be cool in the middle. If it's still warm or you can still see whole leaves, give it a few more weeks. Finished compost is not fertilizer, exactly; it's a soil conditioner. It holds water, feeds the soil life, and loosens clay and firms up sand. An inch a year on the beds and you'll never need to buy much of anything else. And that's all there is to it. Browns and greens, wet as a sponge, big as a cubic yard, turn it when you think of it, and stay out of its way. Go start one this afternoon. Your leaves are about to fall. Pages I recommend Backyard Chickens in the Suburbs - Nancy's hens. Chicken manure and bedding is the finest green there is. Betty's Backyard Vegetable Patch - where compost goes. Giant Pumpkin Growing - Hank in Ohio. The pumpkin people use compost by the truckload. Monarch Waystation - Ellen, a neighbor of mine in this neighborhood. Her milkweed stalks would make fine browns. African Violet Addict - not compost, but a good page. The RainForest neighborhood directory

You are visitor number since March 1998. Now go turn your pile.

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Compost questions answered, usually the same day. Tell me what's in it, how wet it is, and what it smells like.

Last updated September 25, 1999 · © 1998-1999 Arthur Blevins