Getting Lots of High Quality, Free Dirt - My Compost Heap Problem

Two years ago we had to cut down our 100+ year old Pin Oak tree because its roots were compromised after a storm that went through our village. The tree was just magnificent and we really miss it. Every fall it would drop loads of leaves that I would collect and add to my compost heap. The leaves added with other organic matter would provide me with lots of high quality dirt. 

Well, 'If the mountain will not come to Muhammad, then Muhammad must go to the mountain'. When my neighbors clean up their yards guess who's collecting their bags full of pure gold. Of course I return their bags and help the environment is a tiny way. 

I have set up several bins made of free wood pallets at the end of our yard and I add the leaves there. After you add the leaves and the bins seem full add little water and some mixing with the pitchfork and I get what I want, free dirt. 

You need to have at least TWO bins. You'll add material in bin #1 and then a week or two later you can toss bin #1's contents to the other bin. My local coffee shops, DunkinDonuts and Noble Roasters, help me by providing spent coffee grounds. Worms love coffee grounds. Making high quality dirt is easy and effortless. When I toss the contents of one bin to the next, I sprinkle some coffee grounds. As I do that I can hear the worms say "yum yum, yum".

If you don't mix your compost matter it will take about two years before it decomposes and it's usable. 

I always add my kitchen scraps there. I have a bowl next to the kitchen sink and throughout the day as I clean the vegetables, add the scraps in the bowl. The first two years the method worked like a charm. We consume lots of supermarket purchased fruits and vegetables and the scraps go in the compost heap. So far, so good. Supermarkets, though, add these stickers on everything to identify their goods. As you can see the avocado shell below has one such sticker. Quite the conundrum. YOU HAVE TO REMOVE THEM OTHERWISE YOUR FUTURE DIRT WILL BE FILLED WITH THESE STICKERS! They are made of some sort of material that will be in your garden for many years to come. 

By the way, out squirrels love to eat the material left on the avocado shell. We all have to live...

On my way home today I saw one of my neighbors had chopped down several small trees as he is working on a project. Well, tomorrow morning I will pay him a visit and get a few buckets of those wood chips. It will be such a great addition to my compost heap.

Keep on mulching!