A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2006 How to make a compost bin III

That's strange Dave. Was the chicken poop aged or fresh? If it had already composted itself down, it's nitrogen content would have been gone. This would have created an excess of "browns" and would have slowed it down. That's the only thing I could think of.

I just threw a whole load of kitchen scraps in my new pile. Definitely not heating up yet though. There were big chunks of frozen stuff still!

I promise I will get right to this..
*gotta go pick up the wee~one,
be right back!*

OH MY GOSH, PLEASE DON'T TELL MY HUSBAND THAT,
HE ALREADY THINKS IT'S BEEN PICKED CLEAN AS A WHISTLE..

First, I had to look up what you got...

Okay, this is a kinda complicated answer...
First off, this is the one I have Mantis Twin Compost Tumbler
And IMHO it has a few flaws, but I'm not sending it back....
They are all workable, but you've got to play with it and get the feel of it..

First, if you're used to a open~bottomed compost bin, it doesn't work the same way, I feel..
The open bottomed one's have worms and ground moisture and such to work and activate and keeps working the pile..
When you have a tumbler, it's not exposed to the critters that help break it down, or the moisture drawn up from the bottom...

(and different style bins work differently too..
*I have two other regular open~bottomed bins that work differently than the wooden one's I have..*)

I had alot of trouble with mine in the beginning..
Especially with the moisture...
*I did use alot of bottom of the bottles of Pepsi, but haven't had alot hanging around lately.*

But it just seems to stand still, especially if you use alot of leaves....

and they say to chop up everything, that's one of the flaws I think, but that is how you get the compost to work down in such a short time, cause the pieces are soooo small, and smaller pieces have more exposed edges, and the more exposed edges, means faster decomposition...
But you could stand there all day choppin'.. :rolleyes:

I use this product Ringer Compost Plus
I ended up putting it in, and it got those leaves rrrrrrrrrv'd right up and down....
(*it also came with the tumbler, but I have used it for years before that, on my large leave piles in the back yard.. I have my yard, mother's yard and a neighbors yard I use all the maple leaves from, and the pile is HUGE, so I have to do something to get it down a bit or come windy fall or spring days the pile is back on the lawns...*)

Plus for me, I don't tumble mine everyday, I am way too busy for that...

But I have found that the more loads I've done in the bins, there's enough composted compost in the cracks and crevices's that that helps the next load start, cause all those goodie microbe's are in there... *and I sift the bins and put what hunks are tooooo big, into the new pile, which also helps active it too*

The other thing about mine is, I really dislike how it comes out.. most of the time I waste more
than I get in my wheel barrow, that has to be one size to fit under it...

And at least mine, does not come out in small pieces, *like it shows in the commercial/ad for it*, at least for liking, and you can never get it all out, but I guess for the next load~that's a good thing..

Yours looks like the mouth of it, is easier to empty than mine....

The one thing I liked about the compost tumbler is, I'm not sifting worms, it breaks my heart when I'm sifting and I grind one up in the sifting process... so, that's good, but the soil isn't as nice as the other ones'.. but I use it just the same....

Is this yours Dave??
"URBAN COMPOST TUMBLER"

I see for one of the extra's you can buy
is a "TEA" cathcer..
Finally usin' their heads I see..

Mine drains too, I just put two buckets under mine where it drips..

It'll drip mostly when it's had a good raining on the bins...

Also, they sell a Compost Activator too,
"Whitney Farms' Compost Maker Plus (4-4-2)"

That's the very one, Weezie! I got the large model. Everything about it sounded great...even the fact that it didn't have gears and such to wear out. The thing is tough, I must say...really thick, stout plastic. I think it may even have a ten year guarantee, but I forget. The air tube in the center, the crossbars to throughly mix everything...What I've been thinking is that these oak leaves are just very tough and resistant to breaking down. And very acidic. But...they break down when they're in ground contact. Mold and fungal "threads" run through them.
I think that getting the bacteria, etc. established will help. I didn't use any starter/booster, but I did use a scoop of old compost, and some grass clippings which had digested some in a lawn bag...i have a lawn vac/shredder which really does a number on the leaves, but I have noticed that maple, pecan and other less leathery leaves need little help in nature to compost into soil over the fall and winter.
Oh well. Summertime will be the true test...just wish I had tons of clean, chemical free lawn clippings.

oh yeah, Weezie...I bought the compost tea collector, too...I could always just saturate everything in there and collect the juice a week later! Do that a couple times and start over!

You can make a foliar feed too and spray it on the leaves...

I really think that is one of the keys to
those bins, is after it builds up stuff inside,
from load, to load, to load...
To be honest, I really don't use that ringer any more in the bins... it was basically just for a few of the first loads on both sides....

I also have to admit, I don't stuff it as much as
I used to... and over stuffing it probably didn't help it much..

Woohoo the neighbors kittykorner to me just raked up their fall leaves and gave them to me. Woohoo! I have really nice neighbors over there. And isn't that going to be a good starter when I get my first load of grass from the landlord. I can't wait for that. I plan to get out there to day and turn the bin and the pile but so far I've taken a nap instead. I think I'm still tired from the dinner last night. It doesn't take much to wear me out.

Now I'm really wondering what's wrong in that tumbler. I built a pallet compost bin on Wednesday, filled it with leaves, a few scoops of soil and some chicken poop, and watered thoroughly. As of today, it must be 110 degrees just a few inches down! Just like that!

How many batches of compost have you made
with this tumbler yet Dave???

None. After 6 weeks or more last fall, I dumped the first batch and tilled it under...it was somewhat broken down. Then I started this batch immediately...we did have some cool weather, but it's been HOT! Really hot many days this year...it's 80 again today. There's just no activity in the tumbler at all! I've experimented with different moisture levels, more turning vs. less turning...Maybe these Black Jack oak leaves are just too tough. I know I could have composted 4 or 5 batches of maple leaves at the very least by now!

let me add, Weezie, that my shredder does a very good job...the pieces are anywhere from 1/4 inch to 3/4 inch. They have lots of dust from the vacuum action of the shredder...so soil, bacteria, etc. is throughout, before I even add anything...It's just a huge mystery why nothing is happening in there!

I would go with more green, leaves as you know are very tough to decompose..

And with it being a new tumbler, that good stuff,
isn't build up in it from previous loads....

Get some old beer hangin' around and put that in, if there is such a thing

And find some of that Ringer stuff, or the stuff that was sold with your tumbler, I really had to use it in the first couple of loads, but I have not had to in the past 3 summers now...

Well my bin got turned for the first time this year. And I have no green to work with yet so I thought I'd start a yeast culture and see about stirring things up. I'd use beer but I don't drink lol.

Mine's still frozen solid...

Is it really Weezie? Wow. Even with that warm weather this past weekend?

Just some of the top edges are crumpling..

(I do have a big container/bucket of some bagged compost, I will leave in the sun, and it will start to thaw faster, and I can start to sift that for my seed starting mixtures....)
But it won't be for some weeks yet...

We had one spring day, a couple of days ago..
and now we're snowed on again, and freezing temps..
I haven't watched the weather forecast as of late to see what's coming in the next weeks...