Compost tumblers are an important component for DIY at home composting.
These fully enclosed systems turn and mix the composting material while creating the heat required to speed up the process.
If it’s not heating you aren’t composting properly at all.
There are many facets to composting to fully maximize the heat generating process and if a couple of these are skipped in the process you may not be generating the optimum temperature for composting. A quality well maintained compost tumbler is also part of the process.
There are a number of items that shouldn’t be placed inside a compost tumbler as well as a specific ratio of greens to browns.
Action To Be Taken: Insulation is also an important factor. If too much heat is escaping the composting process has wasted effort.
How Well Is the Mix Broken Down?
When breaking down your materials, get them as small as possible. Shred, rip, tear, pull-apart, cut, however you do it, try to keep the materials going into your compost and compost tumbler small.
By encouraging the composting process through heat and microbial – breakdown.
The more easily the lab bacteria can feed on your compost materials, the greater the by-product of heat generated.
The smaller the material, the more contact thus more friction – the more friction the more heat!
By breaking the materials down you are exciting the two components that help produce heat.
What Is the Proper Ratio of Greens and Browns?
The general rule of thumb is to maintain a ratio of 2:1 browns to greens. In other words, for every green you add, you also want to add two browns. Water is only needed, if at all, if it is too dry, as there is generally enough H²O in the compounds being added to keep the moisture in check.
If you are not setting at the proper ratio, that could be the problem resulting in inadequate heat from your compost tumbler. Having too many greens will generally result in excessive water.
Water has an obvious cooling effect. If there is too much water in your mixture, you will probably see it pooling at the bottom.
You can either add more browns to the mix – in the hope that they will absorb some of the water – or, you will need to pour out the mixture onto something dry, like a newspaper.
Once the newspaper has absorbed enough water, place the mixture back in the compost tumbler. The amount of moisture should be enough that you can see that the compost is wet without it actually pooling up beneath it.
Since the composting process requires the work of bacteria, using water with high levels of chlorine or fluoride – which is common with city water – may kill them off, making your work that much harder in trying to get it to create and maintain heat.
Works Best: Use bottled water that is free from those additives or collect rainwater for the purpose of composting.
What Material Should Go into a Compost Tumbler?
The end goal is to create heat and now that you know the proper ratio of browns to greens, you know what kind of materials to use. For greens, stick with vegetation. Brown materials are sawdust, straw, twigs and even moss.
You remember the browns to greens is a 2:1 ratio, so when you’ve done chopping up those items going into the compost tumbler, you want to stick with a cup of greens to two cups of browns.
Corn cobs and stalks, napkins, paper plates and cups, wood chips and even pine needles are part of the brown, while greens might include any and all vegetable matter, manure, coffee grounds (and the used filters), some fruits, hair, teabags and eggshells.
Most of this junk is not that difficult to break down, in fact, you can use a bigger measuring device than just a cup as long as you use it twice for the browns and once for the greens.
The idea is to achieve a healthy balance of nitrogen and carbon, plus H²O to allow the bacteria to do its breakdown thing and create heat. Too much or too little of one or more of the necessary materials can inhibit the heating that is precursors to your eventual compost.
Compost Accelerators and Sugar
Even if your measurements are a little bit off, a good compost accelerator – such as SCD Probiotics – will get the job done and pick up some of the slack. An excellent additive is also molasses; bacteria love them some sugar.
A compost accelerator is just that, it hastens the composition process – the heat level you’re trying to achieve – by fast-tracking the fermentation process.
Composting accelerators include all of the administering methods, with the amounts you’re supposed to use, and how often.
Adding molasses will also quickly ferment, and, as a welcome benefit, add heat.
When to Spin and Adding a Thermometer
The first and most important thing to remember is NOT to turn the tumbler too much. It takes time for your compost to generate sufficient heat and if you turn it too much you dissipate that heat and set the process back. A thermometer will help you know when it is time for a spin.
A good compost thermometer will help you gauge when it is too cold, too hot, or when the fermentation process is active.
Any time the heat gets too much, it is time to spin the drum. Any time it is too cool, you can go over the list above to set it right.
There are plenty of thermometers available, but the “composting” thermometer will list the cool, active, and hot cycles.
Focus on this: Turning your compost tumbler should be almost entirely based on this, a temperature control is your only concern if all of the above is set up properly.
Final Word
If there’s no heat in your compost tumbler, it could simply be a matter of ratios of green to brown being off, materials not being suitable or even being too wet.
Follow the above, and you should be straightening this situation out and getting your temperatures up to a nominal level in no time.
As said, get yourself a decent compost thermometer, spin it when it’s too warm and carefully measure out your browns and greens.
You’ll be composting with heat in no time.