A new record for us
This weekend I recorded the highest temperature ever in our compost pile here in the District of Columbia, about a mile from the White House: 150 degrees. I love digging into the pile to deposit kitchen scraps, seeing steam wafting out of the debris, feeling a blast of heat.
That’s bacteria at work, thermophiles who thrive at high temperature. When they’ve had their fill, they will die back and the pile will cool, indicating it’s time to turn it over and inject more oxygen.
I attribute the higher temperatures to all the coffee grounds we’ve been foraging from Starbucks and horse manure collected at a friendly riding stables. I’m not trying to set any records here, but a little heat does speed the composting process along, and with winter approaching activity inside our uninsulated pile is likely to slow a great deal.
We are engaging the concerns of a hungry planet--slowly--right here in our kitchen garden in the District of Columbia, about a mile from the White House.
Hi Ed,
Wow! Could you use that heat in some way?
Victorian kitchen gardens used hot beds to grow pineapples!
Celia
Celia, you certainly can use that heat, especially if you are composting on a larger scale. You can channel it into a greenhouse, or even into your home. Of course you could establish your compost operation inside the greenhouse, which would not only provide warmth for the compost pile, but would help heat the greenhouse as well.