Permies Poll: How do you compost?

I have every intent to have a hot compost pile but my lack of turning doesn't help out any. The majority of the compost I have on site is made with a cold composting method.

I'm planning on letting the chickens peck through it when I'm 'finished' for some extra weed seed removal.

I threw my apple at bokashi, since i'm always encouraging other people to try it, but i also trench, and cold compost, and use a worm/soil bin, and occasionally hot compost (though I don't usually have the space for a hot pile). it's all good!

Several cold piles that sometimes heat up over 140F when I add a bunch of fresh stuff all at once, but I don't manage them to stay hot. And also a couple of small home-scale worm bins in the basement.

Leaf mold pile, hot/cold/lazy pile and worm bin in basement.

Peace

I have 3 Garden Gourmet Composters, the town had a deal on my first one, way back when, the other two were given to me, I use these to compost the fallen soldiers in my war against my neighbors Japanese Knotweed, barely holding my own. They make great compost. I started Vermicomposting again in March of 2024 with the purchase of two pounds of Eisenia fetidas, I have a 7'x11'x3' leaf bin along with two 6' diameterx3' chicken wire enclosures also for fall leaves. All of my outdoor composting is down at Nature's pace and once the pipeline was full a constant supply. No carbon biomass leaves The Crazy Half Acre. I am also taking a hard look at Composting as a Final alternative behind Burial and Cremation in a program called "Grow with Grandpa". I can only compost with bokashi in the garage now, my first and only attempt was in 5 gallon buckets with screw on lids, I forgot the plate to keep everything submerged and ended up a fruit fly production plant.

First of all, I might prefer a hot compost pile to kill disease and weed seeds, but I rarely achieve it. And second, I have three different kinds of piles: One beside each of my garden spaces, and in the case of the main garden, a pair of concrete block bins--the final turning is onto the ground, and the chickens peck and scratch at this lot. I also have several woodrot piles just within the woods that surround my clearing--these take years, but I have extracted several buckets of good wood-based compost out of the oldest couple--I think this stuff is especially good for fruit trees and berry bushes. And then there is another pair of concrete block bins, covered, in which humanure decomposes; I empty four or five buckets about ten times a year, cover with leaves, and then in spring I clean out the side that's been untouched for a year, use the proceeds in my orchard and maybe some in my flowerbed, and then switch to dumping buckets on that side again. Urine is collected in a separate wooden arrangement with a toilet seat in the house. This bucket gets dumped, when half full or so, on all the compost piles in a rotating sequence. Urine contains most of the nitrogen and phosphorus we secrete so it's important to use it--the nitrogen helps the woodrot piles, especially, work faster. Oh, and one more category: I collect leaves on our mile long lane every fall and winter, chop them, and put them in wire bins (these get the urine in turn too). Leafmold is excellent compost.
I wonder if everyone would agree with this statement: THERE IS NEVER ENOUGH COMPOST. Or at least, surely never too much.

I 'compost everything' (so that's called a 'cold pile'), following the advice of David the Good

I use a slight variation of the Johnson Su bioreactor, adapted for materials at hand and a much wetter climate. It ends up essentially being a large worm bin and makes excellent compost, based on the eye and nose test, results, and microscopy by some Elaine Ingham students.

I am disappointed that the creators of this poll didn't include an option for "composting in place." There are many of us practicing a diversity of techniques that eschew traditional composting methods - and all of the extra labor they entail! - and I would wish that we might be represented in this discussion.

Ruth Stout-style gardening, sheet mulching and other mulching techniques, crimping or plowing in cover crops, or just tossing your kitchen scraps out across your property - one can argue the pros and cons of different methods, but so long as you keep organic waste on your own property and it ends up back in the ground somehow, you are effectively composting.

Staff note (Timothy Norton) : I added a new option to the poll.

Thank you for the addition!

~ Thank you for taking my suggestion seriously and with an open mind.

Current future goal is doing aerobic no turn composting mixing in a bunch of other things.  The eventual goals are 3 fold.  1. generate a high grade potting soil mix replacement for the tomato float.  2.  Generate fungaly dominant compost to make tea with for treating soil and plants.  3.  generate some other compost for other gardening projects.

Humanure? 💩🥗

We have a BB for Ruth Stout style composting. Is this method considered a type of trench composting or composting in place?

We have a bucket we toss things in and we take it down to my MIL's house because she has cold piles in the backyard, + chickens, and she gives us compost that is finished in which I plant my plants.  Its hard because we have two buckets, the bucket to take down and the bucket of finished compost, that's all we can do in our dinky apartment on our patio.  Once, if?, I ever get a place to live with my own yard I will try and create something so we don't have to cart things back and forth.

May Lotito wrote:We have a BB for Ruth Stout style composting. Is this method considered a type of trench composting or composting in place?

That's a great question. I seem to recall Ruth Stout talking about tucking things under layers of straw, so I guess it is composting in place? Yet when I trench (no straw here) I think of her. I more consider chop and drop a composting in place kind of thing, like what I do with my comfrey.
How are other people composting in place?

Here's a hack I didn't mention before: dirt is necessary for humus formation, and I've been told that humus is more stable than plain rot, which can off-gas nutrients like nitrogen. Ever just watch a truckload of autumn leaves melt down to almost nothing? Well- dirt is necessary, but what's really necessary is clay ions. Now trying to get a good dispersal of clay in a pile is a bit tedious, because it clumps.  But- How about a clay slip (as opposed to slipping in wet clay)  So I mine clay when/where it's available, put it in covered buckets and keep it moist. When the time comes I put the clay in a plastic bucket, put the drywall mixing paddle in my half-inch heavy-duty drill and make mud! (being careful about electric shock around water, rubber boots and gloves) Or if I am feely burly bad, and the clay is good and wet I take my drywall  "potato masher" (which looks just like that but is a 2-hand size tool and a real workout.) When you have achieved a fair "clay slip" mix, as the ceramicists use, you'll have something that coats all the regular compost stock and you will like the results. Currently I live in a valley that was covered with beaver dams and meandering rivers, subject to frequent volcanic ash-falls and so finding good useful mineral soil here is dam easy. You can also get good ideas on working with clay from natural builders, who use clay frequently.

Shakin my head, Rick Valley...you're going to all that trouble to get clay spattered into your compost, and my biggest effort is to keep it out of my compost, in excess amounts, coming in on the roots of the weeds. I read once that if you want hot compost, you can't have more than 4% soil ...mine's pretty much always more than that

I do continuous composting in bins,
does it count as cold piles?

Abraham Palma wrote:I do continuous composting in bins,
does it count as cold piles?

I would consider that cold. Hot in my mind there is intentional turning and maintaining of a hot core.

I use a double bin compost tumbler with large doors. I like having one active bin and one finishing bin. I have had it for over 10 years and it still works great. I also have a cold pile that isn't turned and deep mulch woodchips that compost in place. I guess we are a little of this and a little of that over here.

I just built a Diego Footer 'Device for people who don't compost good'.  I also get chicken manure, household compost from the tumbler, and worm castings.

Cold pile for sure! It gets turned...very occasionally. Funny enough, we do have the controversial/frowned upon (and rightly so, for the most part) electric composter from urban living days. We use it primarily for meat scraps and smaller bones to keep the wildlife from digging through the compost. We just add the electric composter "compost product" to the actual pile. It (the composter) does use quite a bit of electricity and there are charcoal filters involved (I did find refillable ones). Bears don't seem attracted to our compost pile at all, so we will likely continue doing what we are right now.

I want to put together a better composting setup.

I think mine /has/ been a version of cold and Trench composting? There are some old garden beds that were dug out about 6 in to a foot* that I would toss yard clippings (and occasional kitchen scraps) when I had the bagger on the mower. Sometimes I just let it mulch. Into. I really didn't do anything else to it. Neither covered nor watered nor turned. And mostly grass clipping and occasionally leaves.

In now looking up the YT? To find out what A Diego Footer reactor is.

* years ago I dug out beds to put straw bales in for straw bale gardening. Great stuff, I didn't need to water the tomato plants. After a few years of neglect the straw bales had decomposed and collapse down into the trench that was dug.

We do a few kinds but our main is a cold compost pile. That's where the majority of the bulk I don't use as mulch goes.

Most of our food scraps go to chickens. Our compost is a mix of chicken litter, rabbit manure, grass and leaves. Before our fire we were growing mushrooms and had a ton of sawdust as well. We throw some ash in every now and then when we have a 'clean' burn. At the beginning of Spring I kind of dig out the underneath portion and stir up what has sat since last year.

The weeds I pull are invasive. Canadian Thistle, Japanese Bindweed and one of the rhizome grasses, assuming crab but unsure. Those all get submerged in water to make weed tea. I'll often add some rabbit poo for a kick.

I have a hot compost started and had great results with one before. This one is only being built/added to now as I mow and clean animal pens. I haven't started the cooking process but might have enough this week.

When I lived in the PNW I never understood why people bothered turning...it seemed we would add food and worms would work it in. A few weeks later, black gold! In this new climate it has been interesting to learn how differently things break down with less moisture. I mean, I understand the concept, but it's been fascinating to watch whole squash turn into hollow shells instead of piles of mush...

Timothy, I remembered to go check on my hot/cold/lazy pile and found ------- that I have a tator vine growing, its about a foot tall.  Wonder what my yield will be?

Peace

I am way too lazy to turn compost, and live in a very dry area.

I use worms for food waste and Johnson-Su bioreactor for farm waste.

Wish there was a "my chicken compost for me" option

M

We have three compost methods, and I want to add a fourth with worms for humanure. The three we have: bins (trash barrels) in which we mix browns and greens (nitrogen) regularly. All our kitchen scraps that don't go to the chickens go in there, and some garden scraps and plenty of leaves for brown (carbon).
A couple yard debris piles that would overwhelm the bins. One of these piles is in the chicken yard, they turn it over, eat some things, and manure it all. We put this in the gardens early in the spring.
Third is direct composting, "in place", in the gardens. This is mostly grass clippings for mulch, and in the fall chopped leaves (chopped with electric lawnmower). We have plenty of grass clippings, as we are still shrinking our lawn, so some of these go in the pile in the chicken yard.
I plan to use plastic bins for humanure, leaving them for a year to compost after filling them, unless I build a dry composting toilet that uses worms-- like this brilliant design which I have used (and liked) in Argentina: Perma Preta on Facebook  Perma Preta website (in Spanish) It was the prototype I used, which consists mainly of a vault in the ground under the dry toilet, a hose from the urine diverter to a five gallon container (good for adding water to dilute), and a grate placed halfway down in the vault on which worms live, eating and digesting the feces which they then drop as worm castings into the bottom. Has to be emptied very infrequently (years!) and no moving parts except a vent fan, which can be passive/wind-driven if you like.

I do various kinds of composting depending on the available materials,  time frame and intended use. I haven't try humaure though.

Recently I tested on a very small hot composting setup with fine materials for next year's seed starter. Total volume is 2.5 gallons and it's done in a 5 gallon bucket with a crack at the bottom.  Peak temperature reached 160F/60C and cooled back down to RT in a week. I am feeling the system is a quick and easy way to teach kids about the science in composting.

Hi, newby here, so sorry if this post gets screwed up.

I use hot composting, most clearly mirroring the Berkeley method.  I have been improving over a 5 year period, and make about 5-8 piles per year, each are about 4-5 ft wide and deep.  I have space for 2 piles and use one of those 2 barrel black plastic tumblers to store all my kitchen waste during summer.  My most important learning over the past few years has been is to learn from others and then apply that knowledge to your local situation.  I bought things the first couple of years, now I try to scavenge.

I added a couple of pictures to show the ‘winter pile’, which is ready for use when I need it (completed it last fall and let it age), and the ‘1st spring pile’ which includes every scrap from our household from Oct - April, along with a bunch of coffee grounds and veggie pulp form my juicing and a local shop.  I ‘capped’ the 1st spring pile with my ‘brown mix’ to ensure nothing gets into the food waste prior to it breaking down.  I will heat this pile up sometime in the next month when I get some grass clippings.

Hi Ed

Welcome to Permies.

My 2026 ready goat/sheep/chicken poop, hay and straw pile first pic.

2027 ready goat/sheep/chicken poop, hay and straw pile second Pic.

I'm actually new to using our own compost from our property. Strictly barn cleanouts at the moment, but I'll be turning leaves and garden clean up into this springs cleanout in the fall.

I'm a little surprised by the strong lead that cold-composting has. It's what I do, but I thought more of y'all were into forking piles over and over. :-)

Situation update:  Now that we are renting a little house with a little wraparound yard we can do our own composting!  We built a three sided bay out of pallets and I put veggie scraps and other things in there like shredded paper from the post (but not the glossy paper), plant bits, bread bits, coffee grounds, ground up egg shells and shredded paper bags from fast food, and occasional bacon grease when we have it. also some paper towels/napkins.  I have my Bokashi set up arriving tomorrow for the meat and citris and bones, and so that will get added once its broken down, plus I'm watering it all, and my new shovel will also arrive tomorrow for stirring and turning it, yes we're getting all the pieces put together as we speak.  Once there is compost I'll shovel it out and put it to the side in the "use it" pile.  We don't have any of that yet because I'm still getting the swing of this.  My MIL says to stir every few days.  I doubt it will get hot enough to count as hot composting.

Riona Abhainn wrote:  I doubt it will get hot enough to count as hot composting.

If you need to turn up the temp, add some vitamin P. In the urban setting urinating on the compost pile might present some challenges but you're adding nitrogen- in my case I'll add the coffee grinds that I use to absorb rabbit urine under their hutches, it gets that temperature climbing, especially if I've got some hay in there too.
You may find it easier to ask your partner to pee in a bottle and add it that way.

I'm getting the swing of Bokashi.  I'm also realizing how little "greens" we have leftover.  Its easier to find "browns" which surprises me.  My new plan is to have a second pile which I'll add things to while the first pile does its thing.  Currently the first pile is functioning but slowly because of our lack of leftoverness.  And I found quickly that if I have too much "browns" then things won't transform into compost.  So I'm still working at it.  It would be easier to know when my original pile is ready to be left alone if it got bigger faster.  It seems like some parts of it break down well and rather quickly and other parts don't.  So I haven't started pile number 2 yet.  Or tried to use any of the compost yet.
Re. piss in a bottle, I've thought about that and considered it.  I'm not quite ready to do it yet though.  But you're right its a great idea.