Greasemonkey's Compost Pile

calliandra

calliandra

Well-Known Member
Hey guys, how can you tell when/whether to turn a pile if the thermal process has half-collapsed? :roll:

My story:
I had a ton of leaves after a storm, half of which were dry, and the other half green-going-yellow and yellow. It looked like 50-50 and was an optimistic day, so I thought I could count those non-dry leaves as greens :mrgreen: (WRONG, I know, but I didn't want to at the time it seems haha).

So I gathered everything hi-N I had: 100L sheep shit, some 70L dry grass clippings, a kilo of kelp, 1L coffee grounds... and a few handfuls of this and that. Added all the eggshells I had and a few sprinklings rock dust, all in layers, all wetted up. The leaves are mainly linden and maple.
2016-10-27 17.46.06.jpg

And the thing started heating up, it was at 55°C (130F) when I left town for the weekend :rolleyes:
I shouldn't have gone, because when I got back the pile was at 66°C(150F) and DRY inside.
Of course I turned it immediately, adding water to get everything back up to 50%.
2016-10-31.jpg

The center has heated back up to 45°C(113F) but that's where it has stayed the last 6 days.
And it smells a little bit, mainly of sheep shit.
But smell means gassing off of nutrients?

My plan was, that if it doesn't heat, to just let it compost on its own.
But it is a bit heated, so now I'm not sure?
Maybe turn it once again and stack it up higher to help against the low temps (we're getting -7°C in the night throughout the coming week)?
Or would that then interrupt the little bit going on now, and make it take much longer to finish?
Cheers!
 
Last edited:
calliandra

calliandra

Well-Known Member
calliandra said:
Hey guys, how can you tell when/whether to turn a pile if the thermal process has half-collapsed? :roll:

My story:
I had a ton of leaves after a storm, half of which were dry, and the other half green-going-yellow and yellow. It looked like 50-50 and was an optimistic day, so I thought I could count those non-dry leaves as greens :mrgreen: (WRONG, I know, but I didn't want to at the time it seems haha).

So I gathered everything hi-N I had: 100L sheep shit, some 70L dry grass clippings, a kilo of kelp, 1L coffee grounds... and a few handfuls of this and that. Added all the eggshells I had and a few sprinklings rock dust, all in layers, all wetted up. The leaves are mainly linden and maple.
View attachment 3824276

And the thing started heating up, it was at 55°C (130F) when I left town for the weekend :rolleyes:
I shouldn't have gone, because when I got back the pile was at 66°C(150F) and DRY inside.
Of course I turned it immediately, adding water to get everything back up to 50%.
View attachment 3824279

The center has heated back up to 45°C(113F) but that's where it has stayed the last 6 days.
And it smells a little bit, mainly of sheep shit.
But smell means gassing off of nutrients?

My plan was, that if it doesn't heat, to just let it compost on its own.
But it is a bit heated, so now I'm not sure?
Maybe turn it once again and stack it up higher to help against the low temps (we're getting -7°C in the night throughout the coming week)?
Or would that then interrupt the little bit going on now, and make it take much longer to finish?
Cheers!
Click to expand...
Well I've turned & stacked it up higher.
P1030560.JPG

This is what it looked like in the middle (still at 40°C after a frosty night), and some of the white growth under the USB microscope
2016-11-08_1_turn2 (4).JPG 2016-11-08_1-usbmicro (1).jpg
The pile is at like 3/5 of its original volume, and was at 20°C when I tarped it up.
So I'll just see what happens :bigjoint:
 
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greasemonkeymann

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
calliandra said:
Well I've turned & stacked it up higher.
View attachment 3825812

This is what it looked like in the middle (still at 40°C after a frosty night), and some of the white growth under the USB microscope
View attachment 3825809 View attachment 3825810
The pile is at like 3/5 of its original volume, and was at 20°C when I tarped it up.
So I'll just see what happens :bigjoint:
Click to expand...
that looks good, one thing is it may be a lil too moist?
hard to say from the pics, but compost does reaaally good at almost the same environment as cannabis, meaning sorta a humid soil rather than "wet"
one of the thing to possibly consider using in that pile is any old soil you may have too
if it smells of anything past "wet foresty smell" than it's gassing off, but remember, manure, is well, manure, so it's not exactly free of ammonia on it's own, considering its typically scooped off the ground with urine as well.
Another thing too, is make sure that manure isn't too fresh, as most livestock get de-worming shots/pills, which may or may not effect the worms you have, which believe it or not I bet even in the cold you have some worms in there
your pile looks great though, i'd get a loose fitting tarp on it too
 
kkt3

kkt3

Well-Known Member
So would it be best to cover my compost piles with a tarp for the winter?

Nevermind. Thanks Grease!!

My compost has a bit of almost everything. All our veggies scraps, lottsa banana peels, grass clippings, maple leaves, comfrey leaves, some kelp, coffee grounds, pee, pot leaves, egg shells, horse manure, a bit off rabbit manure, alfalfa meal. Probably missed a few things, but those are most of the compost.
 
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calliandra

calliandra

Well-Known Member
greasemonkeymann said:
that looks good, one thing is it may be a lil too moist?
hard to say from the pics, but compost does reaaally good at almost the same environment as cannabis, meaning sorta a humid soil rather than "wet"
one of the thing to possibly consider using in that pile is any old soil you may have too
if it smells of anything past "wet foresty smell" than it's gassing off, but remember, manure, is well, manure, so it's not exactly free of ammonia on it's own, considering its typically scooped off the ground with urine as well.
Another thing too, is make sure that manure isn't too fresh, as most livestock get de-worming shots/pills, which may or may not effect the worms you have, which believe it or not I bet even in the cold you have some worms in there
your pile looks great though, i'd get a loose fitting tarp on it too
Click to expand...
Yeah there is definitely urine in that sheep shit, the guy I have it from does a deep bedding style barn, and since his sheep were out on the mountain meadows over the summer it was the only manure he had, so it was from the springtime, not fresh, but certainly contains lots of urine. I forgot to ask him about his anti-worm regime (he's certified organic, but not sure what they use), but will do next time I visit him!

And yes the compost looks really wet in the pictures - but by the squeeze test it was at 50% in the middle, but just humid in most other parts of the pile. So I actually added lots of water while turning it.

I got really busy in town today so haven't checked to see whether the temps are going back up.

But from how it looks, would you say I should turn it more in the course of the winter or just let it go?
 
greasemonkeymann

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
calliandra said:
Yeah there is definitely urine in that sheep shit, the guy I have it from does a deep bedding style barn, and since his sheep were out on the mountain meadows over the summer it was the only manure he had, so it was from the springtime, not fresh, but certainly contains lots of urine. I forgot to ask him about his anti-worm regime (he's certified organic, but not sure what they use), but will do next time I visit him!

And yes the compost looks really wet in the pictures - but by the squeeze test it was at 50% in the middle, but just humid in most other parts of the pile. So I actually added lots of water while turning it.

I got really busy in town today so haven't checked to see whether the temps are going back up.

But from how it looks, would you say I should turn it more in the course of the winter or just let it go?
Click to expand...
well turning it more often tends to steer it more of a bacterial pile, depending on the nitrogen available
so assuming that the manure is high in nitrogen you want more carbons to steer the pile a lil more balanced, as is it's going to be largely bacterial microbes due to the nitrogen to carbon ratio, which is fine, but it means you'll need to turn it more to ensure that it keeps the aerobic bacteria alive and proliferating
annnd also to keep the nitrogen from converted/lost due to ammonia gasoff
 
greasemonkeymann

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
kkt3 said:
So would it be best to cover my compost piles with a tarp for the winter?

Nevermind. Thanks Grease!!

My compost has a bit of almost everything. All our veggies scraps, lottsa banana peels, grass clippings, maple leaves, comfrey leaves, some kelp, coffee grounds, pee, pot leaves, egg shells, horse manure, a bit off rabbit manure, alfalfa meal. Probably missed a few things, but those are most of the compost.
Click to expand...
I do like to yea, to keep the rain off, and to keep the heat in, and also to keep it a humid moisture level.
Another thing to consider is that fruit scraps take a long ass time to breakdown in a compost pile, but not in a worm bin
I like to keep those things in the wormbin, but if you are doing a slow compost it'll be fine
certainly doesn't hurt anything at all, just slows it down a lil
past that i'd be all over having the other things in there.
in fact when I do my trimming I get a brown paper bag, and layer in my trim-leaves, orange peels, or banana peels (I eat fruit like a monkey)...works great cuz the bags are degradeable, the layered moist banana peels or orange peels are enough to rehydrate the dry cannabis leaves, and the whole bag disappears in the compost pile in about a month
I'm all about less work..
I bust my ass all week long and i'll be damned if I am going to work harder than I need to
 
calliandra

calliandra

Well-Known Member
greasemonkeymann said:
well turning it more often tends to steer it more of a bacterial pile, depending on the nitrogen available
so assuming that the manure is high in nitrogen you want more carbons to steer the pile a lil more balanced, as is it's going to be largely bacterial microbes due to the nitrogen to carbon ratio, which is fine, but it means you'll need to turn it more to ensure that it keeps the aerobic bacteria alive and proliferating
annnd also to keep the nitrogen from converted/lost due to ammonia gasoff
Click to expand...
yeah well I do think all in all the pile is weak in nitrogen.
So basically I continue to check on the pile for temp and smell, and if it goes active, to turn.

Whereby, I think the way it looked at 40°, I do think I interrupted something there.
So if the pile gets back up to that now, I'd tend to leave it.
Because I don't think the mix is very nitrogen heavy.
So I'd be disturbing fungal growth by turning, which is quite the opposite of what I want!
 
greasemonkeymann

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
calliandra said:
yeah well I do think all in all the pile is weak in nitrogen.
So basically I continue to check on the pile for temp and smell, and if it goes active, to turn.

Whereby, I think the way it looked at 40°, I do think I interrupted something there.
So if the pile gets back up to that now, I'd tend to leave it.
Because I don't think the mix is very nitrogen heavy.
So I'd be disturbing fungal growth by turning, which is quite the opposite of what I want!
Click to expand...
yea but manure is nitrogen, urea is nitrogen..
grass too..
from what you've told me I think you are good there, remember you want about 5-10% nitrogen.. past that and it's too much
 
calliandra

calliandra

Well-Known Member
greasemonkeymann said:
yea but manure is nitrogen, urea is nitrogen..
grass too..
from what you've told me I think you are good there, remember you want about 5-10% nitrogen.. past that and it's too much
Click to expand...
Actually, I'm even over that. :shock:
I went to do some math, and it's 12% of materials with C:N ratios of 12-20. The rest being leaves and straw, at 50-80.
I got reading in the Humanure Handbook when I went to check for the C:N ratios too... (nice afternoon haha! is really a great read) and there are so many arguments for turning less!
 
greasemonkeymann

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
calliandra said:
Actually, I'm even over that. :shock:
I went to do some math, and it's 12% of materials with C:N ratios of 12-20. The rest being leaves and straw, at 50-80.
I got reading in the Humanure Handbook when I went to check for the C:N ratios too... (nice afternoon haha! is really a great read) and there are so many arguments for turning less!
Click to expand...
Hmmm, well past the obvious unpleasant task of tuning a humanure pile... (gross)
, but a humanure pile is totally different, that's almost always with like sawdust and you WANT high thermophilic bacteria (to create heat to sterilize the bad/harmful bacteria)
for cannabis you don't need that, you want a "cooler" compost
whats their argument for turning less?
seems like a humanure pile would want the extra oxygen to match the microbial population increasing
but I don't know much about humanure piles
um.. that totally reads badly...
I think of this funny sand "castle"
poo pile.jpg
 
greasemonkeymann

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
MustangStudFarm said:


I have not been able to pick up the Golden State games this week? I can get the Bulls 'n Heat on TNT, but I need a "NBA League Pass" for GS? I dont even know what that is, it sounds expensive though. Damn, I already paid for Fox so I could get the Thunder...
Click to expand...
yea, nba pass is the same as the NFL network, really the only time you need it, is if you are following a non-local team
fox sprts just shows the local games to you.
bitches..
besides they were just crushing the mavs
the Toronto/okc game was crazy though
 
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