Amending Compost Bins With Biosolids - February 2024

Yesterday, I shared a round of photos showing the first (for this growing season) load of municipal biosolids that I added to our perennial garden beds as a topdressing.  The goal is to improve the soil and feed the trees and plants.   I also used these biosolids in a different spot:  as a compost bin amendment.  

I've done this in the past - here's a post from March of 2023 - when I dumped some biosolids in as a sort-of accelerant/enhancement to my bins due to them being overloaded with 'browns'.  I thought the biosolids - full of Nitrogen - would help balance out the blend.  

Right now, all three of our bins are F-U-L-L.  The clean-up that I did recently of all the ornamental grasses produced an enormous amount of material.  I posted some photos back a couple weeks.    For this round - I added a 5-gallon bucket (filled 2/3rds of the way) into my 'storage bin'.  The one with the "Feed Me" compost bin sign.    Below is a look at that mound of material on top of the bin:

Adding biosolids to aid compost decomposition - compost bins

And here, below, is a wider-view of all three bins.  The biosolids are piled on the far left 'storage' compost bin:

Adding biosolids to aid compost decomposition - compost bins

I'll find something (a stick??) to rough-up the top of that storage bin so the biosolids will trickle down into the ornamental grasses.  My hope is that between SOME decomposition activity that will begin when the weather warms up AND the sheer weight of the biosolids will compress some of the looser grass material.  Once that happens, I have to then pull the rest of the grasses over from the top of the other two bins.  

Then...it becomes time to turn.  That's an early Spring activity.  And something I should do a couple times this growing season.  

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