Maine

[buckabucka]

If you're a lazy composter like me, it takes about 2 years to turn shavings and poop to compost in a pile. I turned it a few times this summer, but not many. I'm about 90% of the way to compost.

I kind of compost that way too. Once in a while, I'll get a nice balanced mix of things and it really heats up and composts quickly, but I usually have at least one pile with weeds growing out of it.

This year will be interesting, because the chickens are living directly on the garden. We'll pull them off as soon as possible in the spring. They are breaking down the leaves I've been throwing in there nicely.

 

[Mainechick168]

I most def. am a lazy composter. I just have a big pile. I can burn some of the hay? I don't want to cause a forest fire!

 

[hoppy]

no,no, the composting burns it. the compost pile heats up in the middle as it sits and rots in other words, it's burning the hay by breaking it down. no need to set fire to it.

I most def. am a lazy composter. I just have a big pile. I can burn some of the hay? I don't want to cause a forest fire!

 

[buckabucka]

no,no, the composting burns it. the compost pile heats up in the middle as it sits and rots in other words, it's burning the hay by breaking it down. no need to set fire to it.

I most def. am a lazy composter. I just have a big pile. I can burn some of the hay? I don't want to cause a forest fire!

Ha! I misunderstood that too!

 

[hoppy]

I'll go back and edit that post to make it more clear- I'm having a bad night.

no,no, the composting burns it. the compost pile heats up in the middle as it sits and rots in other words, it's burning the hay by breaking it down. no need to set fire to it.

 

[superchemicalgirl]

I kind of compost that way too. Once in a while, I'll get a nice balanced mix of things and it really heats up and composts quickly, but I usually have at least one pile with weeds growing out of it.
This year will be interesting, because the chickens are living directly on the garden. We'll pull them off as soon as possible in the spring. They are breaking down the leaves I've been throwing in there nicely.

I also read in Mother Earth News to use a dark bag and put leaves and stuff in it, vent it slightly and then leave it in the sun, it's supposed to compost quicker. Instead of having garbage bags all over the lawn, I bought a large, dark, plastic olive barrel two summers ago to compost weeds in. They actually rotted down pretty quickly and I'm still not sure I'd call it compost, but it's a start. I plan to throw a few bags of pooshavings in there soon and see what happens.

 

[joanie_maine]

Instead of using shavings from my pens as a compost pile, I use them as "landfill".

The area beside and behind my barn is all brambles and weeds.

But as I have dumped wheelbarrows full of shavings on it and continued to work back toward the stone wall, the weeds have have slowed and the area gets packed down.

When the spread out pile gets hard enough, I weed wack it and finally use the lawnmower .

 

[Gallina Sarda]

compost really well, make sure it gets really hot to kill the weed seeds, otherwise you will be  saying all kinds of colorful things while you weed your garden this summer. I had more grass in my garden one year from the hay in the coop, never never again, burn baby burn!!! flip and burn some more. 
editting to clarify- the composting heats up and burns the hay by rotting and producing heat, no need to set actual fire to the pile. flipping the material every few months helps it cook more.

excellent idea to add the edit about not actually setting the compost afire! Some new gardeners might take you literally

 

[Mainechick168]

no,no, the composting burns it. the compost pile heats up in the middle as it sits and rots in other words, it's burning the hay by breaking it down. no need to set fire to it.

I am aware of the heat created by the break down....haha I thought maybe you had come up with a faster way to do this!!

 

[buckabucka]

I kind of compost that way too. Once in a while, I'll get a nice balanced mix of things and it really heats up and composts quickly, but I usually have at least one pile with weeds growing out of it.

This year will be interesting, because the chickens are living directly on the garden. We'll pull them off as soon as possible in the spring. They are breaking down the leaves I've been throwing in there nicely.

I also read in Mother Earth News to use a dark bag and put leaves and stuff in it, vent it slightly and then leave it in the sun, it's supposed to compost quicker. Instead of having garbage bags all over the lawn, I bought a large, dark, plastic olive barrel two summers ago to compost weeds in. They actually rotted down pretty quickly and I'm still not sure I'd call it compost, but it's a start. I plan to throw a few bags of pooshavings in there soon and see what happens.

I'm loving this compost discussion! Of course, I have questions..... Olive barrel? Where did you purchase this? We do have a dark plastic trash can (with cover), so maybe I can try that. Right now, it is full of other compost.

We tried to take control of our compost area last year. DH moved the giant tangled mess away, dug out some soil and put down sand with pavers on top in a big square. The square will hold 4 wooden compost bins, but we set up 3, with the extra area to stand and work.

It looked great for a while, but 2 of the bins grew giant weed tangles. Then I noticed the "active" bin was filling with sand. We found huge rat tunnels that went under the tile and came up into the compost. We put a bait station in the compost, but they wouldn't touch it. Eventually, DH went into mad scientist mode, putting propane into the holes. We really did have compost on fire, but we haven't seen any tunnels since.

I love the landfill idea, Joanie! We have a couple of landfill areas here, too. We're not actually trying to fix these areas up, it's more a dumping ground, but we're only dumping natural materials.