Leaf Mold Smell

I started my first leaf mold pile. I mulched leaves with the lawn mower and started layering them, wetting each layer as I went. Its been going for 4-5 weeks. I know even with mulching down the leaves, the entire process may take 9-12 months.

I was transplanting a couple of saplings and decided to steal some leaves from the bottom of my pile to mulch around the saplings.

When I dug down towards the bottom, I noticed a manure smell. The pile was slightly warm, maybe 75-80F.

Does anyone know if the smell is normal? I'm hoping to get ahead of any potential problems.

I think that if your pile is heating up and smells like something more bioactive than musty moldy leaves, you are succeeding brilliantly!

I would describe it as an earthy, mushroomy smell.

Douglas Alpenstock wrote:I think that if your pile is heating up and smells like something more bioactive than musty moldy leaves, you are succeeding brilliantly!

Excellent! As you might have seen behind my container, I have a near endless supply of leaves. While I believe my current method may produce the fastest results, it is extremely time consuming. If I continue this way I will be mulching and moving leaves year around.

I am looking to build a few 3 sided containers around the property that I can just blow the leaves into, stomp them down a little bit and let nature do its thing.

If anyone has experience or advice for producing leaf mold at scale, without making it a full time job, I would be grateful!

Here is a more recent picture of the pile.

Producing "at scale"... If they are your leaves on your property, and you can have multiple piles, that would save you a lot of time hauling to one site (unless it were centrally located, but these sorts of things seem relegated to the margins) and then hauling again to redistribute it.
If you want "more", then you might consider "other people's leaves"... whether bagged by other homeowners for removal, or from landscapers. The bags you could collect before the curbside collection happens (you'd likely need a truck), the landscapers could deliver and dump their leaves.

While the leaves are easier to handle when dry, they compost better when wet. So turning a pile on a rainy day is a win-win. Your wire fence pen is a nice way to keep it contained, which will keep it neat and hold in some moisture, especially if you fill it higher at the edges to collect any rain/snow that falls on it.
For turning a pile in a pen, I prefer no posts, and to just hook the ends of the fence together (just hooks, not twisted) so that I can just unhook the loop and peel it away and set up next to the old pile. I even wait until I've begun the new pile, with all the outer "crust" of dry leaves, so I don't have to lift over the fence. (Which I'm sure is why you left the opening between posts.)

At a larger scale, you could have SO MANY LEAVES, that you'll want a tractor, and NO pen, and won't miss a few blowing away... A mesh tarp can help with blowing, but so does turning over, wet broken down leaves don't blow as readily as whole dry ones.