Uncle Marvo wrote:
In reply to covehithe ) who wrote this in
, I, Marvo, say :
My mother has moved house and has a fairly large garden ( grass area
probably at least tennis court size). I have made her 3 wood compost
bins 1 metre square.
I'd go for 1.5m square at the minimum for that volume of grass. YMMV
Question? I get 5-6 containers full of clippings from the mower, is
this too much to put in compost bin as balance of compost material
from kitchen & garden is much less. I am hoping to utilise the
clippings without having to take them to council waste site, if
possible
Miles too much. It will just get hot and smell terrible.
Only if you allow it to get anaerobic and slimy wet.
My compost heap is 2m square and gets about 1 cu m of grassclippings on
it every week throughout the growing season. It gets extremely hot for
a few days and then collapses into nothing. It will destroy hedge
clippings in short order, but works perfectly well with or without
"balancing" N & C content. A hot heap works much quicker.
My instinct is that provided you keep the heap moist enough but not
soggy and don't compress it to an anaerobic sludge it is OK to add huge
amounts of grass at a time. If you can mix in hedge clippings then so
much the better but it isn't essential.
There is a stale smell of short chain fatty acids in the early hot
phase so you don't want it near the house, but it should never small
terrible. I have trouble keeping it wet enough in summer to run fast.
And for a smallish compost heap it makes sense to use a starter culture
like the proprietory Garotta to give the heap some encouragement.
You can leave the
grass in the open and it will dry out, you can burn it then (if you must).
The best way to get rid of grass cuttings is to mow often (don't let it get
too long) and leave it on the lawn. I know this works, but I bet loads of
people argue!
You can, but the fine grass clippings tread everywhere.
Regards,
Martin Brown