Compost - Turning the Pile:

Why turn over a pile of compost? For some of us it is the wonder of looking into an ever changing world in the middle of the pile. Plant erial graduy changes as the compost works. As the pile progresses, it becomes her and her to distinguish the original erial. Smells change and become richer and more earthy. Others are more concerned with getting the erial quickly ready for the gen and turning the pile makes composting faster.

The first turning for a pile rey is the completion of the building stage of the compost pile. Over time, whether a couple of hours during the busy season of gening, or several months over winter, the pile has graduy grown to be about three feet on a side and three feet high. In theory it has been carefully gathered in layers of green erial and brown erial which is just another way of saying green, fresh erial versus older dried ter. What rey happens is we tend to throw any old plant erial on the pile as it builds; weeds from the gen, old leaves, wood shavings from the shop, spent flowers from house and gen, grass clippings, kitchen waste and so on and on it goes.

Start with a manure fork at one end of the pile and drive it h into the side, straight down, moving any and layers if they ever rey existed. This goes in the bottom of the new pile. Work r way around the outside, removing about six inches of the pile. Do the same with the top six inches. Now the outside of the pile has become the inside of the new pile. Do the same with the next six inches and the next and so on until the pile has been removed and mounded up once again. This is pretty heavy physical labor so take some precautions as go.

Take r time. If six inches is too h a fork full, take half. Pace rself, especiy if the sun is hot. Stretch a little before start and a lot more after ten minutes has passed. I find it better to warm up the muscles with light work before stretching. Warm muscles stretch easier and with less pain or chance of injury than do cold ones. Be aware of r health and level of fitness. If turning of the pile at once is too h, do part today and part tomorrow and so on.

Let the pile sit for about three days and maybe four. If look in it the first day will find that it has hed up with the microbial and fungal activity. Three days lr it will have cooled down and be ready to turn again. After only three of four turnings it will be ready to use. Since a pile left on its own may take a couple of years or more to compost, this is a great savings in time.