Backyard compost makers unite!!

Bennythejet said:

could anyone tell me what i could just toss in my hole to boost my plants. obviously organic. would brand new fruit peels andegg shells work good even if they havent been decayed. if so should i chopp it all up.
thanks

Click to expand...

I like to get washed up seaweed @ the beach. No need to rinse the salts off. Not sure if you're at the beach though.

fruit peels are good, egg shells are too, but the egg shells may take a while to decompose in the soil. That's ok though.

Making a base soil from store bought materials.

Making a base soil from store bought materials.

Composting and feeding the soil

I want to share what I doing with y'all but my thread is on another site.
So if the Kind Mods here will allow the spam

http://www.growkind.com/forum/showthread.php?t=26276


I welcome your feedback on the information.

I try to get it at a 20:1 carbon to nitrogen ratio. given how roughly I estimate, it may as well be 30:1.

I havent seen anyone mention the concept of 3 stages.

It's basically an elaboration on Bongasaurus's set up of "one to add to, one to take from.

You see, when the one your adding to gets to the right ratio, you should start another pile to contribute your scraps to. If you keep adding nitrogen filled greens, more of the greens will be dissipated as ammonia gas (stinky), and away wafts the potential nutrition.

If your pile is stinky you need more carbon or you over water.

If it is not warm you are either underwatering it or you need more nitrogen.


I picked up an idea from another online composter.

If you are going to be using a good chunk of your completed batch, rake the pile thin and let it sit overnight. This changes the environment within the compost enough to let the little critters within know that this site is no longer suitable for them. They evacuate(the mobile ones, worms, nematodes etc) the finished in search of greener pastures, so to speak.

If you have your 3 piles in close proximity, that "greener pasture" they are looking for can be found in the nearest hot pile!

I also agree completely with chief smoking bud that you needn't waste money on commercial "compost starters" dirt will do the trick, you just need to sprinkle it through a new pile as if it were a spice in your main dish.

What works better yet is finished compost, before doing the "greener pastures" bit.

It's a little more biologically active than plain dirt and will simply get the composting process started faster.

Turning more often tends to speed up the process, but if it may not be worth the labor depending on your scenario.

turning distributes the thermophiles (heat loving microscopics that are the foundation of the compost process) throughout the pile from the center where their productive fury rages. You see they thrive in heat, but they also create it as a biproduct of their processes.

they can actually create enough heat that it slows production by killing some of them off in the hottest core area.

Turn it and they can colonize further out into your pile while also colling off a bit.
The other reason to turn is for air circulation. some make raised compost beds to keep air flowing underneath.

None of this is stating that you HAVE to turn and water your pile. these are the techniques of a so called "hot" compost. It gives you compost faster.

COLD COMPOSTING.


I must admit I havnt talked to anyone using this method specifically for cannabis cultivation, it seems the labor of love attitude of growers seems very conducive to "hot" composting.

cold composting is basically letting mother nature do her business.
You don't have to water it, you don't have to turn it, but it takes you nearly a year to get the product.

This may be ideal for people who are getting large quantities of ingredients from food service places lumber mills. (by the way, you want RAW sawdust, NOT anything from a source that has been cutting treated wood. you do not want those chemmies in your compost. )

no enclosure necessary, just a place to dump the goods. I recommend putting the greens under your browns and scattering them at least a bit, this will decrease the amount that turns into ammonia gas and will also distribute this fuel more throughly.

This may not be ideal for cannabis because the final nutritional content is more prone to vary since you are not keeping as close of an eye on it. Some nearby plants may uptake nutrients, dry spell spells may slow or halt biodegredation, wet spells may scatter your pile or drown the beneficial lifeforms, etc.

With an abundance of material, cold piles may be the most simple way to deal with all of it. It could work fine for general gardening, but cannabis growers tend to be more finicky with what they expose their plants to.
I could see it implemented for an outdoor grower playing the "numbers game" (planting many and checking up sparsely or not at all until harvest). Lots of compost for lots of plants. but if you have the time or the machinery, you can still make a huge batch of compost with the hot method.

wups. I should really read the entire thread before I throw in my measly 2 cents!

ha!

3BM has it all covered.

Meadowlands said:

COLD COMPOSTING.


I must admit I havnt talked to anyone using this method specifically for cannabis cultivation, it seems the labor of love attitude of growers seems very conducive to "hot" composting.

cold composting is basically letting mother nature do her business.
You don't have to water it, you don't have to turn it, but it takes you nearly a year to get the product.

Click to expand...

In my mind, feeding the soil = "cold composting" But I know what you are saying.

That much time is better suited to make leaf mold in my mind.

I'm on the hot crew for compost to feed with.

Then again it depends on what we want to accomplish. If we are outside then mixding in materials into the soil and then growing a cover crop on it that we turn under in spring works for me.

From Waste Management Department in my hood.

From Waste Management Department in my hood.

Composting Do's and Don'ts
Do turn your aerobic bin regularly. Once every 6-7 days is ideal, but it can be done as seldom as once a month. This will insure that air is supplied to all parts of the pile, and that all the material gets composted. When turning the pile, put the material from the middle of the pile outside, and vice versa, so that all the material will be composted.

Don’t put any meat, dairy products, fats, or oils into the compost pile. These materials tend to putrefy instead of breaking down, and will attract a wide variety of pests, including flies, rats, raccoons, stray dogs and cats, etc.

Don’t put dog and cat wastes into the compost pile. The manure from any animal that eats meat contains several pathogens which will survive the compost process, and affect any fruits or vegetables on which the compost may be used.


Do water your compost pile regularly - every 1-3 days in the summer, less often in the winter. Compost should be as moist as a wrung out sponge. If it gets too wet, air will not be able to get through the pile, and foul odors may arise. Likewise, if the pile gets too dry, decomposition will stop. Both aerobic and anaerobic systems need water, but the anaerobic will require less overall.

Compost posting post...Forgive me, check my mood.

Compost posting post...Forgive me, check my mood.

I like going to my nearest farmers market, which by the way is not near. When I come home, I chop up all my fruits and veggies. Take all peelings, stalks, roots, shavings, etc. and I literaly toss them on the ground. That is my first layer. Second, I recycle my used soil (Ocean Forest) which makes up my second layer. When I cut the grass, all grass clippings make up my third layer. Last, I rake the leaves throughout the week and toss all leaves, twigs and small branches on top. I have heard you can take paper from your paper shredder if you have one, and this could make up another layer. I am beggining a second compost pile using the paper as an addition to my compost. Overall, my compost pile is about 3'X3'X3'. There are a lot of flies and small pests, but I suppose this is all of the composting process. I use a garden hoe to aerate the compost. Hope this is useful to someone. As all growers know, gardening is patience so keep in mind composting is not an overnight thing. When you begin to smell the rich earthy scent of compost, after almost a month, you will get a nice feeling of farming achievement. I am all for composting to feed my outdoor garden, but I wouldn't bring it indoors due to all the pests in the compost you can bring into your indoor garden.

Compost=Less in our landfills as well as feeding our garden!

hi dudes heres a recipe im going to try soon in my diy compost tumbler http://gwagriculture.com/Making_Medicinal_Compost.html
and my home made compost activator
http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/biodynamic.html
happy reading

Damn I just missed a farmers market that was down the street from me, could have walked so easy

Working on a compost area - noticed alot of deer / bear poo on mushroom walks in the woods.. Is adding wild poo / mushrooms / fungi cool ?

I have a question. I may have ran across it in this thread, I don't remember, but anyway, hopefully I can get an answer here..........

I want to know if it's ok to pour leftover beer on the compost pile. I know it's ok to pee on it, but what about the left over beer?

let it stand a couple days to let the alcohol evaporate... alcohol is very bad for the good life in soil.

Thanks for the response , Harold. The leftover beer actually sits longer than that, but now that you've mentioned it, i'll make sure the beer is "flat".

Quoted from http://www.fao.org/docrep/007/y5104e/y5104e00.htm , I strongly suggest the reading of this link for those interested in composting, I consider it one of the most informative compost pages I've read so far. This is just a small part of what's in there.

Compost enrichment

Farm compost is poor in P content (0.4-0.8 percent). Addition of P makes the compost more balanced, and supplies nutrient to micro-organisms for their multiplication and faster decomposition. The addition of P also reduces N losses. Compost can be enriched by:

*Application of superphosphate, bonemeal or phosphate rock (Ramasami, 1975): 1 kg of superphosphate or bonemeal is applied over each layer of animal dung. Low-grade phosphate rock can also be used for this purpose.
*Use of animal bones: these can be broken into small pieces, boiled with wood ash leachate or lime water and drained, and the residue applied to the pits. This procedure of boiling bones facilitates their disintegration. Even the addition of raw bones, broken into small pieces and added to the pit, improves the nutrient value of compost significantly.
*Wood ash waste can also be added to increase the K content of compost.
*Addition of N-fixing and P-solubilizing cultures (IARI, 1989): The quality of compost can be further improved by the secondary inoculation of Azotobacter, Azospirillum lipoferum, and Azospirillum brasilence (N-fixers); and Bacillus megaterium or Pseudomonas sp. (P solubilizers). These organisms, in the form of culture broth or water suspension of biofertilizer products, can be sprinkled when the decomposing material is turned after one month. By this time, the temperature of the compost has also stabilized at about 35 °C. As a result of this inoculation, the N content of straw compost can be increased by up to 2 percent. In addition to improving N content and the availability of other plant nutrients, these additions help to reduce the composting time considerably.

Click to expand...

I've been looking for something juusssstttt like that. Thanks, Relik. Been always wondering how I could jack that compost up with P.

Happiness is a worm compost pile.
Man, I bet I have moved over a million pounds of compost by hand.(no sht)
Started young, as a slave for my dad. We would go around every weekend to the rich neighborhoods to pick up lawn clippings.Bags and bags of them. We would start of by putting water in the bags. Let them set for a few days to ferment, man would the neighbors complain about the smell.
Then come the flies by the millions. They are one of the com-posters best friends. They help on the decomposing.
Then it was time for the compost heap,layering upon layer. I have seen phosphorous glowing when I turned the piles over. That was really cool,blue-green lite coming from the compost.
When the composting would slow down we would add BoPeep ammonia cleaning liquid. This would add extra nitrogen to the compost and heat it back up.

When we finely moved to the country,we built a green house. On a budget we needed a heat source. This is where the 180dgf plus decomposition comes in handy. We got to get all the straw and sawdust from the county fairgrounds,after FFA's shows. The pile ended up being 20' wide 100' long.8' tall. We took garden hose and ran it trough the pile, ran water slowly through the hose. The water on average was about 140dgf, it kept the green house nice and toasty that winter.

Thats my story and I'm sticking to it.

DBD

Do most of you keep your compost pile covered or no? I've read about people covering the pile with a piece of cardboard or a tarp or something, but I've never done it. Just wondering if there's a benefit to covering - keeping heat in, etc. ?

My compost inside a little plasic bin. It's covered all the time

great thread goin here

i use those plastic containers the city gives away. not ideal but good in the city

at what temperature does the composting process come to a halt in the winter? not sure if i should still be adding and turning as regular. its going to freeze up eventually around here...