We each took Thursday and Friday off last week and got a lot accomplished in a short period of time. The weather was cool and gorgeous for the first weekend of March, and we got to take full advantage of the prep time.
Priority #1 for me was getting into the compost and screening what was ready to begin bed amendements in the 2012 vegetable plot (I figure if we name them by years, and add one each year, they'll be easy to label that way).
We have three compost piles going; this one was the oldest of the three and the most "finished"--so we dug in:
Robbie built it for me with old t-posts left behind on the property and some scrap wire, and I had circled it with old straw bales. It's functional! About 8' square, it held A LOT of compost.
We started with two steel grates laid over the wheelbarrow:
These were intended to be campfire cooktops, but they worked great for this purpose--the mesh was neither too large nor too small, and they had enough flex that we could bounce them to vibra-screen the finer stuff.
Time to start shoveling and sifting:
Labor-intensive, yes; but worth it. The end result is lovely:
Coarse-screened and ready to go! We added 4-6" over existing vegetable beds and dug to a depth of 1' to get them ready for the upcoming planting season.
As an added benefit, the coarse organic debris left behind (straw, bark chips, twigs and coarse stems) made an excellent mulch for recently planted grape vines:
Since I work in Grounds and Horticulture for a large country club in DFW, I bring home bags and bags of green plant material when it's pulled out for seasonal color changes. It's a great source of easy green material for composting, but the trash from the public spaces was a chore:
Ribbons, drinking straws, bottle caps, plant labels--it's amazing how much junk can find its way into the compost without you catching it. After screening though, it's nice and clean.
We have about a third of this big pile left to get through as well as two other partially-finished piles that we'll probably merge into one when more green additives are available during the growing season. With our dry, cement-hard sandy soil, we can't have too much compost!
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