- What do we have here?
It looks like the compost is actually heating up.
It finally stopped raining at least for a day.
So I figured I would check on the compost bins,
see how they're actually doing
since we built them in the fall.
If only Gucci would be quiet when I'm trying to film.
She is the loudest head.
Listen to that.
What I'm gonna do is just take a look
at the inside of the compost bin and see what's going on.
But first you gotta check this out.
This is my favorite part of composting probably,
and that would be the steam rise.
You'll go deep in.
Crack it open
Look at that.
So that means we're active.
But what I want to do is just look, because we had a ton
of rain and we just put this in last fall,
so we haven't had a lot of cycling on the compost.
We've been doing more traditional,
like burying the food scraps
or giving them to the chickens or giving them to worms.
This is the first round at the homestead
of having an actual pile.
So I kind of wanna just do an audit,
maybe a bit of a rebuild on this smaller one over here.
That's why I like this panel design 'cause I can just
remove any of these and I can see the quality.
But I just wanna get into the very core of it and see
if we're even close to a more finished compost.
And I don't think.
+I don't think we are, but.
It is steamy in there.
What I want to do is, I know a rain's coming pretty soon.
I wanna bulk this pile up and see if I can get it
to the point where it's more self-sustaining.
It seems like we've had these rains that kind of cool it
down and then they go cold.
Then you have to rebuild the pile.
So I'm gonna try to be proactive here
and build the pile in advance.
You'll notice there's about a couple rungs left
of material I could build up.
So let me show you my secret weapon.
Underneath this tarp,
which I'm really glad we put it under the tarp, straw.
These guys are cheap and it is a great source of browns
in a time where I don't have a lot of browns.
Normally, of course I'd want to be doing this on property.
I just don't have a lot of it right now.
So I'm gonna re-layer this entire pile
with some more browns.
Did a good start.
If anyone knows what I'm supposed to do
about a hen who's always loud no matter what in the morning,
like well beyond the egg song,
well beyond some stressor, just let me know.
I've been trying a little light spray.
Doesn't seem to be working.
But with straw, the thing you wanna make sure you
don't do is mat it up too much.
So I'm gonna put about an inch down
and then I'm gonna steal from the other pile here
and fill this one bin up as much as I possibly can.
It's better to have one well filled bin
than two half filled bins.
(upbeat music)
This bin here, it's a bit smaller but it's equally hot,
so we should be okay as far as the activity
and basically having more volume in one space
is gonna make the effective hot zone much larger
on the interior core of the pile.
I think this is a mistake a lot
of people can make is you sort of go halfway with a pile.
You can get it warm,
but it's teetering on steady and active.
And that'd be about, oh, I don't know.
Let's take a look at the old thermometer here.
So steady range is anywhere
up to 80 to a hundred Fahrenheit,
then a hundred to 130 is active,
130 up is hot.
Ideally you'd actually rather it be
in the hot zone for a while.
I think organic certifications have you
at cycling through 160 Fahrenheit three times to count
as fully organically composted.
But honestly, unless you're really actively managing a pile
at home, it's unlikely you'll get it that perfect.
It's good to just get and keep it
in that active zone for a steady amount of time.
So you can see the quality of this.
It's ready a little bit better broken down.
Sometimes in this middle stage though, I find it kind
of difficult to to identify because it's so wet and brown
and you don't know if you put a ton of soil in there.
Maybe it's just the soil or is it actually breaking down?
I think a good indication is the heat
and then you don't wanna see a ton
of like bug life because it should in theory
be too hot for them to be in there.
So if you do see some of that, like I see right here,
I think that's a sign that
either this pile wasn't hot enough or maybe I just took it
from the side where it's a little bit cooler
and maybe recycling that
into the center will help break that down.
(upbeat music)
So take a look at this scoop here.
This came from the corner.
You can see there's a bunch of pill bugs in here.
I'm sure like that's actually a younger one.
This is a much larger one right here.
That's actually one of the biggest ones I've ever seen.
That's a monster.
But yeah, I mean you've got a bunch of pill bugs.
There's clearly a colony going
on 'cause there's tons of tiny ones.
There's some worms and some pincher bugs.
So I know that this is not hot.
And also just to the touch,
it is probably about a hundred Fahrenheit.
So we need to make sure that
we fully break this guy down.
Those guys still play a part.
I mean, they're more
of like a cold composting organism
that will break material down.
I mean, remember in the forests and in nature,
it's not like you have perfect hot compost piles
at all points in time.
That's something I think it's important to stress.
So a lot of people think, oh, if I'm not,
perfectly optimizing my pile, I'm not doing it right.
Well, you know, this is a hyper efficient way
of what mother nature already does.
You don't have to do it perfectly optimal.
But I have to say, as I'm getting down here,
I'm actually getting pretty pleased with what I'm seeing.
I'm seeing some beautiful worm life.
I'm seeing some way more broken down material here.
There's some proof that eggshells don't compost that well.
Honestly, you'll still see it kind
of like this after about three, four years.
It'll still just be sitting like this.
So if you're gonna do it, I'd grind it.
We also have one of our least favorite friends here
the the old fig eater beetle,
which I will see if the chickens want.
All right girls.
Oh, Rufio.
Rufio, oh, water's got it.
With the grubs, they always end up grabbing it
and then like playing go-kart
and wanting to be the only one that has it.
(upbeat music)
So since we started this pile,
in raw time it's been about
oh, about four or five months or so,
but we've rebuilt it a couple times.
One time it just simply went full cold and so we did a more
full layering strategy with straw
and some other brown materials.
And then we just recently kind of filled this pile up
and tried to build this one up, realizing that eventually
we'd need to steal it for this material over here.
But yeah, I mean it just fluctuates over time.
We've got a ton of different inputs that are coming
at all different times of the year.
So just do your best.
I think I'm pretty good here on my brown materials.
I am not gonna water this in because I know I have
a half an inch of rain coming tomorrow.
So what I'll do is do a final straw top off to kind
of like basically a mulch on top of the compost pile.
Now, another way I could have built this,
if I had more material to put in right now,
would actually have been to steal
from this bin and migrate it down the line.
So re-layer this bin.
And that's because basically what I would have in the core.
(chicken clucking).
Without having the core is a really well broken down
like I don't know, 60% to 75% finished compost
that I can migrate over here.
Could recycle the larger bits in here
add new material here, and then this becomes
the secondary tier that once this one's done,
you really start getting towards a more fine compost.
And then as you go down, you basically could get
to the point where if you really wanted to,
you would actually screen the compost out and you'd have
all that nice organic matter in a really sort of fine state.
Or at least not like big old chunks of un-decomposed stuff.
And then fully broken down material.
I decided not to, I decided to just rebuild this
original bed, because quite frankly,
it just wasn't full enough.
But when this one's done, now what I'll do is that process
I just described, but I'm really curious to see what
the internal temp is like right now.
So I'm gonna go straight down to the middle,
push it right down in and take a look at the temp.
You're gonna see it rise.
We're in the steady range already,
so we're above 80 Fahrenheit.
We're at 90 now.
So it looks like we're holding
Pretty steady at about 90 Fahrenheit.
But I did just rebuild the pile.
So I want to check in
in about an hour and see if I've got anything else going on.
All right, let's check on noisy girl here.
I'm actually gonna maybe make her a little happier.
Gucci, will you relax?
Look at her.
She just thinks she's gonna get mounted right away.
You're not.
You're fine.
You're so stressed.
Just calm down.
Daddy's here.
Okay, just relax.
All right.
What I'm gonna do is skim the top layer of bedding off.
It's kind of like a light plane.
You don't really need to do this, but I'm gonna go ahead
and do it 'cause I wanna steal some of this
for really good fertilizer in ocular compost inoculate.
So I'm just gonna come in.
They tend to put their droppings down right
about this area and I'll look for a nice chunk.
Kind of just skim this layer here.
I need a better time fork honestly,
'cause this is not doing that much.
This is the fork I should have been using the whole time.
(upbeat music)
Look what we've built for you Lav.
Look at this.
We've built you a beautiful compost pile.
What's she gonna do?
Let's see what she's gonna do.
Honestly, this would actually be a heaven
for her because there's so many bugs.
I wonder what we would she would do
if we put her in this small one here.
This little playpen.
Oh, she just got a pill bug.
She is demolishing these pill bugs.
She ate a pill bug that was like three quarters
of an inch long.
Boom, pill bug, pill bug, pill bug, pill bug.
Oh, it's getting real guys.
Guys, okay, that's enough, that's okay.
Okay.
Okay, this is too much.
(upbeat music)
Gotcha, gotcha.
I got you, I got you.
Gotcha.
They're smart, but they're dumb.
Chetty's just been feasting over here.
I gotcha.
We rebuilt the pile.
We had a little fun with the chickens.
Let us know what composting topics you wanna see.
So much to do.
Don't feel like I've done enough there.
I need to start working out more.
I've been running more lately guys.
Gimme your fitness tips down below.
I'm working out like five days a week.
Clearly I need more help.
Good luck in the garden and keep on growing.