As a form of repurposing, I suppose, my compost pile last year was the most successful I've ever had, staying continuously hot and processing pretty much anything I could put into it in a short time. Wanting to see if I could keep it hot all winter, I needed some ingredients I could add to my regular kitchen stuff to keep the hot composting going, given that there's not a lot of green stuff available during the winter, other than coffee grounds and vegetable scraps. For those who don't compost, hot composting requires a mix of what are called greens and browns, which are not necessarily those colors.
Greens include grass clippings, weeds, vegetable scraps, coffee grounds, meat, and manure, while browns include dead leaves, wood chips, shredded paper or cardboard, paper towels, straw, hay, and so on. Ideally, the mix should be 2-4 parts browns to 1 part greens. Both browns and greens are easy to come by from late spring to fall, but greens are harder to come by in the winter. When temperatures are too low, some browns (paper towels, egg cartons) and some greens (meat, cat litter) compost slowly. Additionally, since my compost pile is too large to turn over, which wouldn't be a good idea in cold winter temperatures anyhow, I use an auger to punch holes in the pile during the winter that I fill with compost materials, capping them with shredded cardboard and wood chips. When the balance isn't right, or there is too much water, that part of the pile might go anaerobic and turn smelly or slimy.
Greens are nitrogen-rich, while browns are carbon-rich.
Okay, now on to the topic. I needed something that would serve as a green, yet not compost too quickly. Since vegetable scraps tend to break down quickly, while meat scraps and cat litter are slow, there is a risk that the fast-working greens will run out before the meat or manure is composted, and the pile would go anaerobic, cool, and then freeze. In past piles, the center of the pile didn't freeze, but it also didn't stay hot enough to process some of this stuff.
So, I chose something in between - split peas. I was looking for something intended as animal feed, and found some, but it was more expensive than the human-grade stuff. I bought 20 pounds of split peas and 20 pounds of cracked corn, the latter intended as animal feed. Cracked corn is classified as a brown, but it has more nitrogen than other browns, like cardboard, which I have a lot of year-round. Things like melon rinds and banana peels are greens, but they are susceptible to turning into smelly slime if the balance isn't right.
Rather than eating it or feeding it to the squirrels, I repurposed it by adding some split peas and cracked corn to each auger hole I drilled in various parts of the compost pile throughout the winter. It worked great. Even at below-zero temperatures, any auger hole I made near the center of the pile was steaming hot, and it lasted through our long winter. The center was steaming hot, and the periphery (except for the outer couple of inches) was warm enough to keep the composting worms alive.
Greens include grass clippings, weeds, vegetable scraps, coffee grounds, meat, and manure, while browns include dead leaves, wood chips, shredded paper or cardboard, paper towels, straw, hay, and so on. Ideally, the mix should be 2-4 parts browns to 1 part greens. Both browns and greens are easy to come by from late spring to fall, but greens are harder to come by in the winter. When temperatures are too low, some browns (paper towels, egg cartons) and some greens (meat, cat litter) compost slowly. Additionally, since my compost pile is too large to turn over, which wouldn't be a good idea in cold winter temperatures anyhow, I use an auger to punch holes in the pile during the winter that I fill with compost materials, capping them with shredded cardboard and wood chips. When the balance isn't right, or there is too much water, that part of the pile might go anaerobic and turn smelly or slimy.
Greens are nitrogen-rich, while browns are carbon-rich.
Okay, now on to the topic. I needed something that would serve as a green, yet not compost too quickly. Since vegetable scraps tend to break down quickly, while meat scraps and cat litter are slow, there is a risk that the fast-working greens will run out before the meat or manure is composted, and the pile would go anaerobic, cool, and then freeze. In past piles, the center of the pile didn't freeze, but it also didn't stay hot enough to process some of this stuff.
So, I chose something in between - split peas. I was looking for something intended as animal feed, and found some, but it was more expensive than the human-grade stuff. I bought 20 pounds of split peas and 20 pounds of cracked corn, the latter intended as animal feed. Cracked corn is classified as a brown, but it has more nitrogen than other browns, like cardboard, which I have a lot of year-round. Things like melon rinds and banana peels are greens, but they are susceptible to turning into smelly slime if the balance isn't right.
Rather than eating it or feeding it to the squirrels, I repurposed it by adding some split peas and cracked corn to each auger hole I drilled in various parts of the compost pile throughout the winter. It worked great. Even at below-zero temperatures, any auger hole I made near the center of the pile was steaming hot, and it lasted through our long winter. The center was steaming hot, and the periphery (except for the outer couple of inches) was warm enough to keep the composting worms alive.
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