Diary of a Compost Pile - April 21

Here is another in the ongoing series of diary entries by guest author Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile, the compost pile built during my Basic Compost Workshop. --- Eric

Oh, Diary!

You will not believe what just happened! Eric got back from his weekend away and he couldn’t keep his gloves off me! My God, it was amazing! Excuse me for being explicit, but he turned me top to bottom and totally forked my browns out! I tell you, it’s not the size of the garden fork, it’s how you use it, and now I know why they call him the Master Composter!

He really took his time with it too, lingering over every decomposing morsel in my steaming heap. Almost everything was decomposing nicely, just the way you want. Some of my straw had matted down a bit, so he gave that some special attention with the fork. So nice! And some of my more exotic ingredients, like the cardboard, had barely begun to decompose at all, so he tore those into smaller pieces. Oh, yeah, he did! All of the food scraps had completely disappeared, along with all the Roscoe poop. Everything smelled nice and earthy, just the way it should, with no stinky parts (except for a few of the straw mats, which he was polite enough not to mention).

He really knows what I like. He brought me that dead bouquet of wilted flowers I wanted.

He fed me a bucket of kitchen waste.

He added some miscellaneous yard trimmings, threw in a few more shovels of chicken manure, and made sure I was moist as a wrung-out sponge.

The whole time he was rolling me around the bin, he was singing a special song he had written just for me. It’s an adaptation of Bob Marley’s “Stir it up,” as sung to a compost pile. It made me feel so special.

Stir it Up, Compost Pile

Stir it up — Compost pile!
Stir it up — Come on, pile!
Come on and stir it up — Compost pile!
Stir it up — Oh, pile!

It's been a long, long time,
Since I built you in my bin;
And now that I stand near, I smell it all so clear,
There's some turnin’ we should do, pile, me and you.

Stir it up — Compost pile!
Stir it up — Come on, pile!
Come on and stir it up — Compost pile!
Stir it up — Oh, pile!

I will push the fork, and I’ll stoke your fire,
And then I'll satisfy your steamin’ heart's desire;
I will turn your food scraps, top to bottom;
All you got to do, pile, is to rot ‘em!

Stir it up — Compost pile!
Stir it up — Come on, pile!
Come on and stir it up — Compost pile!
Stir it up — Oh, pile!

I will quench you, pile, when you’re thirsty;
Heat you up, till you are hot;
Your humus, pile, is so tasty,
When your greens and browns all rot!

Stir it up — Compost pile!
Stir it up — Come on, pile!
Come on and stir it up — Compost pile!
Stir it up — Oh, pile!

This was really a turning point for me. My temperature had dropped to about 100 degrees.

After all the turning, my temperature dropped to only about 63 degrees.

But with all my new greens and oxygen, by tomorrow I will be a seething volcano of hotness again!

-- FR

Diary of a Compost Pile - April 18

Today I bring you another in the continuing series of diary entries by guest author Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile, the compost pile built during my Basic Compost Workshop. --- Eric

Dear Diary,

It’s me, Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile … not that anyone cares.

I’m here losing my hotness by degrees and shrinking more and more every day, longing for any small display of kindness, perhaps a dead bouquet of wilted flowers or an old banana peel, anything ... and then I find out HE IS GOING AWAY FOR THE WEEKEND! I may be stuck here decomposing in the far end of the backyard, but NOBODY puts Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile in a corner!

I don’t want to cause a stink, but I could easily hold my breath for three days, deprive myself of oxygen, and go completely anaerobic! Let’s see how he likes that! Come back from his little getaway to find me smelling like a three-day-old rabbit turd omelet!

I know it would be a rotten thing to do, and I am too well balanced to ever get that funky, even if I wanted to, but I WON’T just be IGNORED!!!!

-- FR

Diary of a Compost Pile - April 17

Here is another in the continuing series of diary entries by guest author Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile, the compost pile built during my Basic Compost Workshop. --- Eric

Dear Diary,

You know who it is.

I'm a little freaked out right now. I think I might be losing my hotness. My temperature today was only about 143.


I know 143 is still pretty hot, but I used to be 145! And I'm only less than a week old! How can this be happening? And I honestly think I'm beginning to shrink! I used to really fill out a bin, but look at me now. Does this bin make me look short?


Maybe I need to get some work done. I wouldn't mind being turned once in a while. But Eric doesn't even really come around at all anymore. Last night he left my lid off. What's that about? I mean, I don't want to be high maintenance, but I'm not a "no fuss" pile either!

-- FR

Diary of a Compost Pile - April 16

Today's post is another in the continuing series of diary entries by guest author Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile, the compost pile built during my Basic Compost Workshop. --- Eric

Dear Diary,

It's FR again.

Well, I seem to have reached the limits of my hotness. My temp today was about the same 145 degrees as yesterday.


I'm still pretty freakin' hot, but I always dreamed I would be more than this. Can this really be all there is? I'm wondering too if I've started to sag a little bit. After Eric topped me off on the 13th, I filled the bin to just a couple inches from the top, and now I must be at least 6 inches down from the top. What is happening to me?

Eric barely paid any attention to me at all --- just came in to check the thermometer and left.

-- FR

Diary of a Compost Pile - April 15

I am running another in the continuing series of diary entries by guest author Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile, the compost pile built during my Basic Compost Workshop. --- Eric

Dear Diary,

Yes, it's me again, Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile.

I am officially a hot, hot pile! My internal temperature this morning was 145 degrees! Not only am I decomposing the greens and browns I was fed when I was made, but I am cooking any pathogens and weed seeds that are in my hot, steaming middle!


I could tell Eric just wanted to tear into me. He wants to know what is going on inside --- what makes me rot. But I gave him that steamy look that only a hot pile can give --- the one that says, “Look all you want, but I’m too hot for you!”

-- FR

Diary of a Compost Pile - April 14

Today I'm featuring another diary entry by guest author Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile, the compost pile built during my Basic Compost Workshop. --- Eric

Dear Diary,

It's me, Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile.

Is it hot in here, or is it just me? My temperature this morning was about 130 degrees! About 5 degrees more and I will be hot enough to pasteurize pathogens and kill weed seeds!


Master Eric pretty much left me alone today --- just peeked at my thermometer and went about his business. I think this is a good sign. For now, I’d just like to be alone and build up my temperature.

-- FR

Diary of a Compost Pile - April 13

Here is another diary entry by guest author Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile, the compost pile built during my Basic Compost Workshop. --- Eric

Dear Diary,

It's me, Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile.

The workshop participants left me in the care of Master Eric. Technically he is still a Master Composter in training, and that means he is still in his nerdy, enthusiastic stage --- I hope he doesn’t get to be too over-solicitous and fussy! I mean, compost happens, and I’m going to do all the work, so there is no need to keep fiddling with me. I suppose it’s nice to have a little attention now and then, but let’s not get obsessive.

For example, the first thing this morning, I saw Master Eric coming at me with a two-foot-long thermometer, and all I could think was, “That thing doesn’t look oral!”

“NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!”

Sure enough, no conversation, no kitchen scraps, no water, just BAM, and there I am with a huge thermometer sticking out of my heap.

A little abrupt, but the truth is that I am warming up to this guy. I was nearly 100 degrees after less than one day! I was actually almost exactly 98.6 degrees --- I felt almost human.


After checking my temperature, Master Eric began fussing around with me. He decided maybe I wasn’t quite as damp as a wrung-out sponge, so he sprinkled some water on me. It’s common for new piles like me that have a lot of dry brown material not to absorb the water sprayed on us when we are first built, especially if we are built in a hurry. We absorb it better after we have sat for awhile.

He also decided to add in the other 15 gallons of medium-sized, unfinished compost material he had sifted out of my predecessor pile, and cap me off with some more leaves he raked up around the garden. That is all brown material, so to balance me out he added a good amount of bagged chicken manure that he had got from the store a while back. Man, I hope I don’t start to stink! I already had a load of Roscoe droppings, and now all this chicken poop too? I don’t know how much more of this shit I can take.

Frankly, with all the disturbance, I sort of lost my decomposure. The whole experience left me a bit cold --- my temperature dropped back to about 80 degrees.

-- FR

Diary of a Compost Pile - April 12

Today I am welcoming a guest author to the blog. I am posting diary entries written by the compost pile built by the participants in my Basic Compost Workshop. Some of these are a few days late, but we'll soon catch up to "real time." It's all yours pile! --- Eric



Dear Diary,

My name is Fertilemyrtle Rottenpile. I am a compost pile, and this is my story…

I was created today by a group of Basic Compost Workshop participants under the instruction of Master Composter Eric Renger.



They built me using the hot-pile or “batch” method, assembling me all at once of alternating layers of browns, water, greens, and air. I feel nicely balanced --- about equal parts greens and browns, damp as a wrung-out sponge.

I contain all kinds of interesting ingredients. My browns are mostly leaves and chipped woody prunings from around the yard and about 15 gallons of large, unfinished compost material sifted out of my predecessor pile, but I also have a little bit of straw, some cardboard, some newspaper, and a few paper napkins. My greens are mostly shredded leafy material from around the yard, but I also have a generous load of vegetable trimmings, about 10 pounds of Starbucks coffee grounds, and a pile of poop from Roscoe the rabbit. I am a very diverse pile!

It’s great to be here, and I hope to get rot down to business. I feel I am going to be a very hot pile! I am very grateful to the workshop participants for building me so nicely, and I’m sure I will be a pile that they can be proud of --- nicely decomposed, and not a bit smelly.

-- FR

Basic Compost Workshop

Sorry I haven't posted anything in such a long time, but I have been very busy preparing the house and garden for the upcoming Bay-Friendly Garden Tour and for my Basic Compost Workshop that I conducted at the house on Saturday, April 12th.

All Master Composters are required to do some kind of outreach project to teach at least 10 people how to compost. I decided to do a workshop on Basic Composting (as opposed to Worm Composting), and I invited friends and family.

I present the workshop. (If you look closely, you can see that my eyes are closed. I was like that the whole way through.)

It was s lot more work getting this workshop ready than I would have expected. I wanted to do a hands-on workshop in which we actually build a pile, so I needed to empty my own full-to-the-top compost bin. In preparation, I sifted the whole cubic yard of compost twice, so that I could show the participants finished compost (material that passes through the 1/4-inch screen), unfinished compost that could be used for mulch (material that passes through the 1/2-inch screen but gets caught in the 1/4-inch screen), and bulky unfinished compost that needs to go back into the pile (material that gets caught in the 1/2-inch screen). That's a lot of sifting.

I point out some of the sifted material.

I also wanted to have enough ingredients ready so that the participants could build a whole cubic yard pile. So, for "browns," I gathered about 20 gallons of leaves and dry brown material from around the yard. And for "greens," I ran about another 20 gallons of moist green material from the yard through my shredder. I already had the 15 gallons of bulky unfinished compost I had sifted out that needed to go back into the new pile, and about 15 gallons of the finer mulch-like material that I could put back in. I also wanted some more exotic materials to show, so I gathered some straw from a feed store, got about 10 pounds of Starbucks coffee grounds, arranged for a gallon of rabbit poop, bought a bag of chicken poop, and saved up about 2-3 gallons of kitchen vegetable scraps. That's a lot of materials.

I prepared samples of amended and unamended soil from the yard, samples of compost from my system and from different commercial sources, and samples of my own mulch and commercial mulch. That's a lot of samples.

Some of us smell the various soil samples while family members appear to mock us for sticking our noses in the compost. It actually smells really good!

The presentation itself took a long time to prepare. I think I actually covered a lot more than what is required for the Master Composter outreach project, but I've seen a few of the really good workshops that the paid employees of the Stopwaste.org organization present to the public, and I wanted to do one that was at least as thorough as those are. I adapted one of their outlines, and I made my own visual aids. It took a few days to put the whole talk together and it runs about 2 hours long. That's a lot of talking.

I think it worked out pretty well. With questions and delays, the presentation went a bit longer than I expected, but people seemed to enjoy most of it, especially the hands-on parts. They all asked a lot of good questions, and I think they all learned something. I had a lot of fun with it. Because it was all friends and family, and we were having it here at the house, we had a barbeque afterwards, which is always a good time.

I demostrate construction of the Biostack composter.

One of the participants adds material to the pile while I appear to kick him in the behind.

One of the participants adds water to the pile.

I add a load of rabbit poop to the pile.

The compost pile we built is doing well. It has heated up nicely and is really starting to cook. I'm sending out e-mail notices to the participants so they can see how their excellent pile is doing. And I will now be welcoming a guest author to this blog --- the pile will be posting periodic diary entries.