The Official, "Will It Compost" thread...

[Dixana]

Can I put the nasty, caked together, moldy clumps of grass I cleaned out of the under side of the lawnmower in the compost pile?

[The Helpful Gardener]

YES!

[Halfway]

I know there may be a seperate thread on Sun Chip bags, but searched long enough.

After 90 days, I can say that it is another hyped up go-green marketing tool with negligeable results. The bag is NOT decomposted while everything else is to include whole banana peels, watermelon rinds (4-8 inch), and apple cores.

The coloring has faded and there are some tears, but there is no way this thing is composting in a landfill. My pile was turned about every ten days and was cooking quite well.

Bummer.

[The Helpful Gardener]

My Sunchip project is not quite as old as HWs, but I am reaching the same conclusion...

I like their chips (occasionally) but if this is hype, I'm boycotting.

And what is in that material anyway? I'm not composting it in my regular pile until I know...

HG

[nes]

This is more a should-I then at can-it:

Bugs from the pool?

It's a little blow up pool but there is a filter & there is chlorine in the pool.

[The Helpful Gardener]

Lots of trace elements, not much protein, and the bacteria that eats chitin is a good insect check in the soil...

I say yes; the chlorine gasses off quick...

HG

[Halfway]

This is more a should-I then at can-it:

Bugs from the pool?

It's a little blow up pool but there is a filter & there is chlorine in the pool.

Maybe we can float sun chip bags in the pool and THAT may decompose them?

[planter]

I put a lot of stuff nto my compost piles that I know I will be seeing for years. I really don't mind as I am still benefiting and I like a pretty rough product anyway. My soil cries out for some "partially" finished compost.

Clam shells, mussel shells, Lobster bodies, fish skins and racks, deer bones, broken teracotta, plant labels, rusty old bent nails and unidentified pieces of iron. I just flip anything that needs a few more years over my shoulder and into a new pile.

The stuff I dig up in the gardens each year is funny. I keep finding old fish tank marbles from when I dumped a tank in the heap 15 years ago. I find toy soldiers, matchbox cars and such. I'm like an archeologist.

As long as it's not toxic throw it in. It might be with you for awhile but so what.

[rainbowgardener]

I don't understand the point of nails, iron, terracotta in the compost pile. I thought the point of a compost pile is that it is ORGANIC materials. ... OK so you accept that they won't break down (which was the point of this thread, will it compost, I.e. break down). But it doesn't seem to add anything...

[applestar]

Ah, but *I*'ve been adding bits of broken terra-cotta in my compost pile. I used to have a spot where I put broken terra-cotta pots and saucers not far from the compost piles, then one day I looked at them and said, you know, the little pieces will serve no other function so I might as well put them in the compost to soak up the good stuff and add drainage. I still have larger pot halves and whatnot that I haven't decided if I should pulverize with a sledgehammer, but I'm tending towards that conclusion.

[planter]

I've put nails in with potted plants to add "iron" when I get a yellowing of the leaves that just "might" be an iron deficiency and I have without a doubt had nails rust and oxidize to a point where they can no longer be found in the heap or ground.

As far as broken pots and small rocks I just figure they will add some loft which in turn will hold a little more air which in turn will help things along.

I also figure with terracotta I am just putting it back where it came from.
The pile is the perfect place for old broken terracotta. What else are you going to do with it although it does replace rocks at the bottom of pots for drainage and I do use the broken pieces like a puzzle around delicate new planting or seedling to stop the soil from being overly disturbed when I water.

Given time everything goes back from where it came even though I might not see it get there. .

There is a BIG pile of oyster shells in the woods next to the house and there have not been any oysters to speak of in the North River in decades and decades. I actually think without proof that they are from the native americans but wherever they came from they ARE adding calcium to the area.

Composting does not require a finite recipe like baking. Unturned naturally rotting detritus and duff recieving NO attention is still gonna be better than nothing.

[parker34]

Great thread!!
Not sure if I missed it or not, but how about Kashi Pizza boxes?
They are not the glossy pizza boxes, they kinda look like really thin cardboard.

[rainbowgardener]

sure cardboard boxes as long as not wax coated. The left over pizza sauce is just a bonus! If you don't want them to take too long to break down, it helps to tear them in pieces.

[parker34]

Thanks Rainbow!
What about finger/toe nail clippings? Not a big item, but what else can you do with them?

[The Helpful Gardener]

Even I won't go certain places...

HG

[Deb_NY]

Great thread..! I'm learning.. Thank you, everyone.

[planter]

Parker.. I compost nails but they happen to be old iron ones. I just can't say that I have ever thought of adding toe nail clipping to the heap. It's not that I don't think they wouldn't compost it's just that I've never thought of it...

I've pit composted a road kill Raccoon as a place to plant a future tree so I can't imagine they would be anything but good but still dude you have slipped off the deep end of gardening. Welcome and it's good to see you.

Maybe I will see you down on the beach gathering seaweed or shoveling guano out of a very old barn attic cause there was just SO much pigeon "activity". Of course we'll take the old mumified pigeon carcasses and feathers with us as well. A year in the pit and they will be gone too.

[The Helpful Gardener]

If it lives, it composts, but really, guys... I mean, c'mon...

We do want to keep the family rating...

HG

[planter]

HG I have every confidence that our family rating will remain intact. Aside from myself I see no one drifting away from sanity.
As a side note an English Oak seedling resides over the raccoon. The interesting part is that they are somewhat common around here on the coast as their ancestor's came over as acorns mixed in with the ballast of sailing ships...
Yuh just can't get to much organic matter..

[rot]

..
Nail clippings and hair are fine. Hair and dog fur take longer and will clump so mix that stuff well or let it set for a while.

Got a bucket in the bathroom for all of the above plus snot rags.

Maybe it don't amount to a whole lot but the diversity of ingredients I think brings more than just the calories.

to sense
..

[RamonaGS]

I was wondering about composting ivy. Will it start growing in my compost bin? Is there a trick to composting it, or should I just not bother?

[rainbowgardener]

Ivy is one of the few things I just don't bother composting. I have thrown ivy trimmings in the compost pile and a year later they were still looking green and healthy. Just isn't worth the trouble to me. If you could chop or grind them up, they would compost, but I hate to try running it through my little chipper shredder, I'm worried about tangling the blades up. So I just bag them... hate ivy!

[karenslife]

Ok I'm new to this. I've been on the waiting list for an alottment for abt 8 years and got 1 last week.
It's completely overgrown with long grass & dandelions so got a lot of clearing to do.
My question is can I compost the dandelions? Been looking it up & there are a lot of differing opinions on this.
Please help?

[toxcrusadr]

If they are blooming or full of seeds, you are likely to get viable seeds in the compost unless you can get the pile very hot and turn it a couple times to make sure everything gets cooked at a high temp. I avoid putting dandelion seeds in for that reason. If you don't' mind pulling weeds, go right ahead. Likely the patch will have plenty of existing seeds anyway, from the sound of it.

BTW dandelion flowers will go to seed even after they are dead!

[applestar]

When I don't want dandelions to come back, I put the flowers/seed heads in my "drowned weed bucket".
It's just a 5 gal bucket 1/2 filled with rain water. Add any questionable weed clippings and plunge with a tool, stick, or booted foot until all parts are submerged. Keep covered with breathable but insect barrier cover (I use a piece of burlap folded twice = 4 layers, tied on with a haystring.) Keep this next to the compost pile and add to it until full, then let it ferment for about a week to 10 days. It starts to bubble so don't fill to the top.

When everything looks "digested" and it sort of smells like fresh horse manure, use the tied on burlap to filter the contents. I dilute this and use to water/feed trees and shrubs, fruit trees, etc. Sludge left in the bucket goes in the compost pile (amazing results -- heats up quick) Burlap gets dried in the sun and the dried out "cake" is popped off and put in the compost pile.

[watermelonpunch]

I have thrown ivy trimmings in the compost pile and a year later they were still looking green and healthy.

The reason for this happening would have to be explained to me by a biologist, a horticulturist, a physicist, and a theologian, and I would probably still be really creeped out!!

Not that I go through the compost with a fine tooth comb & tweezers or anything. ha ha. But really I've just been amazed at how quickly dead plant material just "disappears". Or at least becomes unrecognizable and much smaller in size.

If I put something in the pile, and it was still recognizable months later... I would definitely put that on the "non compostable" list!!

[applestar]

I have a separate dry pile for English ivy which keeps invading from the woods behind our poroperty. They had originally move out to the woods from the next neighbor's fence line border where they planted it.

I pile them up dry and they go through the summer drought until they are completely crisp, then I can stomp on the pile to break them down and stat composting. Sometimes, if they catch a good amount of rain while still alive, they start to grow out of the pile. Tenacious.

[RamonaGS]

I think Dandelions and Ivy are the zombies of the plant world. Nothing seems to completely kill those things. Maybe add mint to that group too, LOL

[rot]

..
The only time I've composted ivy was after it desiccated in the sun out on the driveway after a few weeks on the driveway. Even then I started to itch when I tossed it in. That stuff grows on gum trees, painted fences and concrete block walls. Insidious.
..

[RamonaGS]

I'm just tossing the ivy out in the city "green waste" containers. They can deal with my zombie plants, LOL!

I am curious about if anyone knows if mango pits break down? Do they need to be chopped up and broken up like avocado pits?

[cynthia_h]

Mango pits break down. Along the way, though, compost worms *love* using them for little hide-outs.

Certain persistent and invasive plants, e.g., English ivy, poison oak/ivy, and blackberries, are nothing but trouble in most people's compost piles.

Cynthia H.
Sunset Zone 17, USDA Zone 9

[RamonaGS]

I was warned about the ivy already, and the other plants you mentioned I don't have around. But thanks on the heads up, I'll have to keep those in mind if I do end up with those around.

What about blueberry clippings? I did plant a blueberry bush...do they have a tough time breaking down?

[applestar]

...I would try to root blueberry clippings...
(though so far, I'm ground layering the longer lower branches)

[rainbowgardener]

I'm just tossing the ivy out in the city "green waste" containers. They can deal with my zombie plants, LOL!

I am curious about if anyone knows if mango pits break down? Do they need to be chopped up and broken up like avocado pits?

OK now I'm curious. How do you chop up avocado pits? They are another thing I regretfully throw away. They seem so full of life, I hate to do it. But I don't need an avocado forest full of trees that may not produce anything in my lifetime and have to be dragged in every winter. And unchopped they don't break down anytime soon. It never occurred to me that you could chop them up.

Incidentally, I throw away the avocado shells too, which also don't break down in compost pile. Has anyone tried putting avocado shells in with the drowned weeds? I was wondering if they would compost if they were soaked for awhile first?

[cynthia_h]

I just split my avocado pits in half along the natural dividing line. If I don't do it, they seem to do it themselves in the compost bin. No big deal.

Cynthia

[RamonaGS]

I break up avocado peel and toss it in my compost for extra aeration. Cynthia, I was told to break up/chop up avocado pits or they could grow. Avocado trees are so temperamental I just would rather not even try to deal with them yet. They grow well in our area, but fruiting is another matter. People will live no more than a few blocks apart, treat their avocado trees exactly the same way, with fertilizer, companion trees, watering, and climate, but one person's trees give an insane amount of fruit, and the other person's tree is beautiful, but gives nothing. My grandma had 3 trees for 15 yrs, never fruited, and when she gave them to someone who lives on the opposite side of the same town only 3 miles away, the things are now fruiting like fiends. I'll probably try my hand someday, but phooey! Not until I am ready, LOL!

[toxcrusadr]

If you have an old stump near the compost bin, and a garden machete (or a hammer, in the case of avocado pits), it will make short work of em.