Composting Questions

[tortoise]

I did some reading of old posts around here and spread out the pile so it is only 1-1/2 to 2 feet deep and aerated the middle. I think I will try to turn/aerate it every day - I will probably only remember twice a week.

Apparently, the more oxygen it gets, the less it will smell? The inside kind of smelled when I messed with it yesterday. I have a crabby neighbor that thinks my rabbits and compost pile stink.

The rabbits stunk when I was on vacation and the nieghbor girl didn't clean the trays. But other than that... ??? I basically need to be out there and doing something so he feels better ???

I hate close neighbors! We are on the very edge of a city of 2,000. We have close neighbors to both sides, and the back borders someone else's backyard. Houses across the street to.

I moved here from living in the middle of a city of 65,000. But I lived on a dead end road. Highway on one side, a stream on the other, and only 3 neighbors. Good fences and tons of trees so nobody had direct view of the yard. I miss it!

Back to compost --

If we spread the pile in the garden, it won't have enough mass to be hot and will stop composting? Do we spread it fall or winter?

 

[ducks4you]

Just had a V-8 moment.
Dig a pit and bury your compost. Mark it with bricks, if you think you'll forget where you put it. It won't smell. All of the beneficial bugs and microbes will do their thing anyway to it. When it heats up, the dirt on top won't catch fire. Give it a few months, they dig it up for use.

 

[tortoise]

What is the chance of the thing catching on fire?!

It steams (smokes?) and the some of the stuff in the middle is gray like ashes.

Am I being silly?

 

[valmom]

I actually have heard of compost piles catching fire, but I don't think it is all that common! I get the gray ashy looking stuff in my manure pile, too (along with saltpeter), and it steams and feels hot, but I don't think it is particularly combustible. It does melt the snow off itself all winter if I geta good hot pile going.