Extreme Composting

Forerunner · #**1481** 03/24/12, 10:19 PM

What, already ?

I was just sayin' how I really shouldn't go into detail.

Mickey · #**1482** 03/24/12, 10:29 PM

Hmmmmm, moonlight,stars,lingerie and a COMPOST PILE nearby?
Poor poor Lori

You go for it girl

The sisterhood is with ya!

Forerunner · #**1483** 03/24/12, 10:32 PM

I'll just plead the 5th as to just how far we'd have to reach out the bedroom window to access the closest pile.

Thank God for the Bill of Rights, eh ?

http://www.homesteadingtoday.com/gar...mpost-bin.html

SmokeEater2 · #**1484** 03/25/12, 09:51 AM

Today is new pile day.

Time to clean out a couple of barn stalls and the chicken coop and add it to the mud coated leaves that piled up to the top of the fence row during the last rain.

I've also got a bunch of old dusty loose hay in the barn loft that's going into the mix.

It's gonna' be a pooptacular day.

Forerunner · #**1485** 03/25/12, 10:07 AM

Man!!! Sounds like a smorgasbord!

Freya · #**1486** 03/25/12, 01:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jlrbhjmnc

I am thinking about it! I'll have to pm one of those mod err ate ours (he he) about this

.

Trisha in WA · #**1487** 03/25/12, 06:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Forerunner

Flour is just another ingredient to put a smile on the microbes faces.
Think of it as treating them to doughnuts.

Thank you so much! Out it goes!

SmokeEater2 · #**1488** 03/31/12, 05:33 PM

OK, I know the folks with real heavy duty, large sized grinders or shredders wouldn't even cross the street to spit on my little Chipper Shredder but it's a step up for me.

Yesterday my wife found a 10 HP. older Troy-Bilt Chipper Shredder that looked like it had been used very little and maintained really well and the price was right so I went and picked it up this morning and hauled it home expecting to at least tear the carb down for a good cleaning.

I noticed that it had about a 1/4 tank of gas in it and all the fluids looked good so I decided to give the starter rope a pull just for the heck of it.

One pull and it (literally) roared into life.

I know it's not a big deal to many of you, But I'm looking forward to grinding up oak leaves and cardboard for faster composting.

am1too · #**1489** 03/31/12, 09:33 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SmokeEater2

OK, I know the folks with real heavy duty, large sized grinders or shredders wouldn't even cross the street to spit on my little Chipper Shredder but it's a step up for me.

Yesterday my wife found a 10 HP. older Troy-Bilt Chipper Shredder that looked like it had been used very little and maintained really well and the price was right so I went and picked it up this morning and hauled it home expecting to at least tear the carb down for a good cleaning.

I noticed that it had about a 1/4 tank of gas in it and all the fluids looked good so I decided to give the starter rope a pull just for the heck of it.

One pull and it (literally) roared into life.

I know it's not a big deal to many of you, But I'm looking forward to grinding up oak leaves and cardboard for faster composting.

I get mine already ground or use the brush hog. Have some very long piles of leaves to make powder out of.

SmokeEater2 · #**1490** 04/01/12, 08:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by am1too

I get mine already ground or use the brush hog. Have some very long piles of leaves to make powder out of.

Yeah, I agree that the Bush Hog works great but it would be a pain trying to bring it into the yard.

Lloyd J. · #**1491** 04/01/12, 10:37 AM

I got woodchips delivered this year. Hydro had a thousand hour contract with an out of province firm and they were going to take the chips to the landfill.

I managed to talk them into bringing them to me.

Lloyd

SmokeEater2 · #**1492** 04/01/12, 03:58 PM

Oh heck yeah! Nice pile o' chips Lloyd!

Ya' know, We really need a compost shoveling smiley in the line up.

gimpyrancher · #**1493** 04/04/12, 06:32 PM

You know, what to do with leftover hay is dependent on what you are short of. If you have plenty of N, then by all means compost it. If you have a lack of N, then feed it to the cows and let them make what you need. It may not be the first quality being old but mix it in with new hay and let them eat it.

Forerunner · #**1494** 04/04/12, 07:16 PM

....and, what they don't eat becomes bedding and gets pooped on, anyway.

Genius, I say. Pure genius....... Whoever it was that designed this world of soil, microbes, nutrients and flora.

Copperhead · #**1495** 04/04/12, 09:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gimpyrancher

You know, what to do with leftover hay is dependent on what you are short of. If you have plenty of N, then by all means compost it. If you have a lack of N, then feed it to the cows and let them make what you need. It may not be the first quality being old but mix it in with new hay and let them eat it.

Give it to the pigs! They can really make good use of it

bama · #**1496** 04/05/12, 06:13 AM

question - once the pile is nice and steamy, how long will it stay that way? once it heats, should i just leave it alone (i.e. stop breaking it open to watch the heat rise LOL)

Dieselrider · #**1497** 04/05/12, 07:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by retire2$

What are the benefits and/or negative effects of spreading fresh sawdust mixed with horse manure directly on your pasture?

My neighbor uses sawdust (not sure if it is hardwood or softwood) in her box stalls for her horses. She cleans daily and replaces all the saw dust each month. I was thinking if I bought a wheel driven manure spreader she could put this directly into the manure spreader and I could spread it over my pasture on a monthly basis. I have a few cows that I rotate through the pastures. They are on the pasture for 1-2 days before they are moved. I then use a riding mower to mow the pasture. I drag a length of chain link fence behind the mower to break up the cow plops. The amount of sawdust would be 2 one ton truck loads per month spread out over 1/2 to 1 acre lots.

Thanks in advance for any and all replies.

I have been reading this thread from page one for the past few days and would like to thank those involved for the valuable info up to here. I will go back and finish the thread but, felt the need to interject something here regarding sawdust directly applied to fields, whether pasture, crop land or garden. As someone mentioned back on page 41, when raw sawdust or wood chips are placed into the soil, they will absorb nitrogen until they are saturated with it and then they will release it slowly over time. If you apply it this way, be prepared to see a decrease in the grass production in that area as the saw dust/ wood chips compete with the grass for nitrogen until the chips are saturated (possibly a couple years).

I have been experimenting with bio char this past winter and incorporating it into my gardening this year and that is one of the things they warn about with bio char (wood cooked to get the oils out and leave the high carbon content intact) is to place in in water or compost piles before introducing into the garden as it will compete with the intended crops for nutrients is you just place it on raw.

Hope this helps and I would be interested in hearing the results of anyone using sawdust raw in your own words. Thanks.

Now, back to reading.....

Forerunner · #**1498** 04/05/12, 08:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bama

question - once the pile is nice and steamy, how long will it stay that way? once it heats, should i just leave it alone (i.e. stop breaking it open to watch the heat rise LOL)

Nice and steamy ??!!!

Bama..... this is a family friendly thread.

The duration of your heat cycle correlates directly with the mass quantity in the pile. The bigger the pile, the longer it heats.
Mega ton piles can stay hot for years.
The pickup full or two sized piles might heat four to six months.
When the heat is gone, the worms move in....sometimes sooner around the edges. Don't be terribly tempted to use the material until it cools and cures.
Compost can certainly be spread and used before then in lighter applications, worked in well..... but working in the truly finished product has its own multiple rewards.

....and, yes, for crying out loud, quit playing with it.

Forerunner · #**1499** 04/05/12, 08:24 AM

Welcome aboard, Dieselrider.

I haven't read through this entire thread for some time, nor the nuts and bolts counterparts that were posted in the survival forum some time ago..... but, somewhere, I wrote extensively about sawdust, woodchips and the nitrogen factor.

Your description was spot on, and I have experimented considerably with the stuff.
Some of my best ground is that where I've spread pure, though aged and darker colored sawdust and tilled it in and walked away for 18 months.
That ground is now like black sand and coffee grounds. I get quicker and more uniform germination there with grain crops, and the richest green.

Why ? Because carbon feeds the microbe and larger soil life that produce the enzymes that break down and release blocked nutrients that already exist in otherwise sterile soils.....
Some claim that there are no nutrients in waste wood products, but, taken as an unsupported statement, that is very misleading.
Waste wood products, in my experience, are the most solid approach to reconditioning dead or bland soil for the long haul. They are also the foundation, generally the cheapest and most abundant, for building a larger composting operation.

My focus on the land here has not been to tip-toe in my soil amending and simultaneously hope to get a marketable crop each year. My focus has been to incorporate thousands of tons of material while I have the means, in hopes that generations down the road will benefit.

That said, with an eye for detail and a patient sense of discipline, one can build any size composting project they can manage and apply the finished product to their ongoing food production operation without any interruptions in productivity.
The finished and cured product is nothing short of miraculous.

am1too · #**1500** 04/05/12, 06:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Forerunner

Nice and steamy ??!!!

Bama..... this is a family friendly thread.

The duration of your heat cycle correlates directly with the mass quantity in the pile. The bigger the pile, the longer it heats.
Mega ton piles can stay hot for years.
The pickup full or two sized piles might heat four to six months.
When the heat is gone, the worms move in....sometimes sooner around the edges. Don't be terribly tempted to use the material until it cools and cures.
Compost can certainly be spread and used before then in lighter applications, worked in well..... but working in the truly finished product has its own multiple rewards.

....and, yes, for crying out loud, quit playing with it.

But it is so much fun!