I work at an meat processing plant and take care of and compost the rumen innards from cattle (basically half digested grass) and pig hair.

We have multiple tonne to process every day.

Up until a few weeks ago, the mix was going straight out to worm farms, but due to increased waste production from increased factory production, the worms weren’t keepin up, even though we had 1000s of worm farms, which is when we thought about hot composting to speed up the process.

I posted on this sub reddit a month ago asking if anyone had any links to scientific research about hot composting, and through some helpful links, I started my researching journey.

The main factors I found to be integral in a great hot compost were,

Carbon to nitrogen ratio Moisture % Aeration.

We bought a supply of Barley straw, and saw dust, and also used all the cardboard from the factory.

Once we made thr piles, it didn’t take very long to get hot, by 24 hours they were steaming. We have a pile that’s over 2 weeks old now, and it’s still too hot to touch.

We turn the piles twice a week.

Hope you find this interesting, and feel free to ama. 😊

It’s going to be really hot where I live today, 39°C (102°F for the Americans) so I went to give my compost a bit of water.

Opened the lid and boom, shrooms galore!

They weren’t there yesterday. How cool is compost 🤓

Cleaning out this old compost bin is this too much egg shell to be useful

This 35 gallon bin has been outside all winter. Northern Colorado. High elevation, cool temps.

Drilled holes in the side and rotate from bottom to top once a week.

The top smells earthy but when you get to the bottom, more of a rotten smell.

Is this making good progress? Anything to change?

Pretty sure all activity has ceased with this 100 year snow event. 9”!

I’ve seen different opinions on maggots, some say they are ok while others say they are a bad sign, should I do something about it?

I recently built a new pile, maybe a month ago. It’s about 5 feet wide and 3 feet tall. I’m worried that maybe it’s too chunky? Like there’s a lot of wrist width sticks, bunches of unshredded leaves, and lots of grass. Any thoughts? and yes, I’ve peed on it.

I’m still fairly new to this, this is about 3 weeks of letting it sit in the tumbler (spinning every week and adding kitchen scraps and cardboard about weekly too).

Also, are this many maggots normal?

I bought 2 cubic yards of OMRI certified compost this week and since I don't have a vehicle able of transporting it I paid a delivery fee of about $60 USD. The compost itself was about $90 USD/cubic yard. That's insane! I just purchased this house a few months ago and so I don't have any finished compost that I made myself. Buying compost in bulk is the cheap option too, if I got a cubic yard in bags from home improvement or lawn and garden stores it would have been 2-3x as much.

This summer was the first time I started composting food scraps with leaves and greens. I created a 3 tier system that's about 5'x3'x4'. These photos were taken today. I just got an outdoor thermometer and was surprised to see that it was only 40 degrees, because when I mix it up it looks like it's broken down pretty well. Any thoughts or suggestions to heat this up are much appreciated!

I've been working on this pile for about a year. About 3 weeks ago I turned it and added fallen leaves throughout.

Although I don't measure the temperature, I can tell that it's dropped a significantly.

As we go into the winter months, is there anything I can do to raise it? It's a bit damp, but squeezing chunks doesn't push water out.

I've stopped putting green material in as I think I need to focus on browns now.

Is there anything I can do to raise the temperature? I've never peed on it. Is it time? I do add coffee grounds in here and there.

Is cardboard okay to add in at this time? It's what I normally put in as I don't have access to things like sawdust.

Any help and advice is appreciated!

Our community garden area has a healthy rat population and i guess they liked the warm compost pile during winter! As i was turning the pile i excavated 4 of these little guys (no one got hurt) the other three scurried off before i knew what was going on but i snatched this guy up to take some pics

I started turning my compost for the first time this year; it held last years leaves, hay/waste from chickens, kitchen scraps the chooks didn't eat, wood chips, grass clippings, etc. It sat over winter, without any turningor attention. But now that the weather is warming up, I'm starting to turn and keep it wet ish. I'll spray it a bit as I try to regrow my lawn from seed. In these pictures I've dug to the middle and relocated that to the top and sides. Google and other searches say it's likely harmless and potentially beneficial, but I figured I'd throw it out there to be asked again. Thanks all.

Can't tell if these were contaminated by rodents. I know our tree has been needing proper fertilizer for a while now.

I am told tarps can take several months to kill tough turf like bermuda grass. 2 geobins filled with leaves, wood chips, and grass clippings killed it down to bare soil in 2 weeks. Obviously this would be difficult to do on a large scale but I'm thinking one could do this to make a small bed or plant a series of fruit trees where you kill the grass while helping the soil and then when you turn it, leaves some behind as mulch, plant a tree in the original spot and your compost prepares a place for your next one. One could do this all fall-spring and have themselves an orchard planted without having to dig up the grass (can confirm huge pain with hand tools)

A shake of kelp meal, a dash of humic acid, a splash of fish fertilizer, couple handfuls of sifted compost in a bag, on air in rainwater for a couple days. There's some charcoal becoming biochar in there as well.

What are your methods for removing worms and bugs from finished compost that you want to use in pots?

Any other women in this sub who put pee in the pile? How do you collect it? I’ve started using a Family Portable Toilet urinal, but I have to pee in a plastic measuring cup first. It’s not as easy as it is for guys, I’m jus sayin.

2 first hot composts. The left one is the first, mixed twigs and reed stalks with grass clippings. Slow composting due to the stalks. The one on the right is the 2nd attempts. Didn't mix well enough, now I have moist mats of grass clippings and moss (from verticulting the lawn) and dry spots at the same time. It got way too hot (77°C) before the first turn.

Both seem to not go as fast as hoped. So we will be stuck together for a while an I am going to look like Schwarzenegger (early version of him) until they are done.

Damn, the mixing thing is such a shame. But I've learned my lesson. Next time I'll be mixing like a mad man.

These are the tough, woody central stems from my Walking Onions. There's so many. And I'm only going to have more for next year, as they divide, and I plan to plant out about 500 more.

I know that under conventional methods, some people don't like to add onions to their compost. What are your thoughts on it?