It is springtime and that means it is time to get seriously into making some compost. I have always had a bunch of compost piles; I have a worm bin to process kitchen scraps, I keep a moldering pile that processes clippings from around the property, and in the spring- around now- I start building some thermophilic piles. I always start the season by tearing down the moldering pile.

The last of the moldering compost going through the screen. The thermophilic piles are in the background

The moldering pile is about three to four feet high and about 8 feet across, in a circle. It is contained by an old strip of four-foot high fencing wire. In late summer and fall, I begin filling the pile with whatever plant material I have. I don’t do anything to the pile, I just pile stuff in it. In the spring I open it up and run it all through a 1/2 inch hardware cloth screen. Things that fall through the screen go onto the various beds around the property. The things too big to fit through the screen get set aside to be used in the thermophilic piles. Some large woody pieces repeat this cycle over several years.

This year I paid particular attention to exactly what was going through the screen. I noticed there was a lot of non-plant material. I sorted out little pieces of plastic plant markers, plastic plant pots, and landscape fabric. It didn’t take long before I had an entire 5-gallon bucket of plastic trash that had been generated in my garden! I have been aware for a while that I was bringing in too much plastic for my garden, but this really made it hit home. I seriously need to do something to reduce my plastic consumption.

All of this plastic trash came out of my compost pile!

After I got over my plastic shock I moved on to my thermophilic compost piles. I am taking a permaculture course from Matt Powers and have been reading a lot and watching a number of videos about making compost. While watching videos by Elaine Ingham I was convinced that I needed to buy a compost thermometer. I have been making compost for 40 years, but I never measured the temperature of it. I learned that compost needs to be between 130 and 160 degrees and stay at that level for a couple weeks to get the optimum benefit from the compost. Now was the time to see if I was doing it right!

I built three piles just like I always have. They got hot, just like they always did. But they only got up to 110 to 120 degrees, and then fell back to around 100 degrees. When I turned the piles, I added more nitrogen, and more water to try to get the pile hotter. I still wasn’t getting over 130 degrees. I turned the pile again, adding even more nitrogen to the pile. At first, I couldn’t understand what I had done wrong since I built the piles just like I always have. But I realized before I was using my sense of touch and smell to decide when to turn the pile. Now I was using a thermometer. It turns out I have been doing it wrong for decades!

I had a hard time getting my compost up above 130 degrees.

I will be using the thermometer from here on out!