Sunday, June 29, 2008

Now I Have Two Compost Piles to Turn

I don't take care of my lawn very much. I fertilized it for the first time this spring in about 5 years. My husband used to mow it but got tired of the weekly chore, so now we hire someone to do it for us. Mostly we ignore the lawn.

It does however produce grass clippings. I love grass clippings. Our last lawn service used to use a mulching mower and the clippings would go back to fertilize the lawn. This year the lawn mowers that they use collect the clippings. I noticed this spring in the back yard (natural woods) that I had grass clippings sprinkled about. They didn't haul the clippings away but dumped them in the back. This was gold to me.

I raked them up along with the leaves that cover the ground under the trees and started a compost pile. It was annoying however to rake the clippings up. Surely it was more work for the men to sprinkle it about than to dump it in a pile. And it was easier for me if it was piled up. So I talked to one of the guys about it. Could he dump it right in front of my compost pile? He said sure and did so that day.

However the next week I got a surprise. I had about twice the amount of clippings than I had had the week before. I didn't ask for the extras, but he had guessed that I wouldn't mind more, so that is what I got. All this grass combined with my leaves, makes for a ton of compost. Usually I have to buy some in the spring, but I'm wondering if I will have enough for all of my garden. If he continues and my leaves don't run out, I'll have a new compost pile about every two and a half weeks. And that is a lot of compost. And a lot of work turning.

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