Cultivation > Composts

Will sycamore be a good leaf mould ?

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Paddy Tobin:
It is usually recommended that leaves are stacked in open mesh so as to allow air to circulate but I have never done this and have successfully produced good leafmould for many years. I collect the leaves and pack them as tightly as possible into bags. The bags are of a woven synthetic material which I source from my neighbouring farmer who has every bag which ever entered his farm over the past fifty years I think. They were used for grain seed. I see the same kind of bag used here as coal bags also. These allow air and moisture to enter and leave the leaves. I fill the bags, tie them and stack them. Stacking gives the weight Ian describes above. I find the bags at the bottom of the stack are ready for use within twelve months; those at the top take longer, often left to the following year. I think those at the bottom have guaranteed moisture and good weight on them. Depending on timing I sometimes use them as weight and insulation on top of a compost bin. I do about thirty bags in this fashion each autumn.

Sycamore leaves should work perfectly. My selection is mainly ash, hawthorn and horse chestnut as I have approximately 60 metre stretch of these along one boundary of the garden and then there is the general selection which comes from the garden.

Paddy

Paddy Tobin:
By chance I recalled that I had taken some photographs of the leafmould stack of bags. You may notice that the bags on top appear to be still quite large and those underneath are quite flattened. This is because those on top have not rotted as well as those underneath. After taking the photograph I turned the stack upside down to continue the rotting process and will probably use at least some of the leafmould later in the autumn.

Also attached below are two photographs of a compost heap I opened earlier in the month. This heap was covered in March of this year - witness the top layer of hydrangea prunings. By the way, loads of these prunings had actually begun rooting. This top layer was taken off and thrown onto the heap presently being built and the second photograph of the compost heap shows what was left for my use in the garden. Note how the hen has been attracted by the plentiful availability of worms.

Paddy

t00lie:
Wonderful rich looking compost Paddy .

A dying art down here maybe ?.
I've been landscaping/gardening for nearly 20 years and there would be very few younger folk that i can remember making compost.
 
It is mostly been the older clients of mine that have and use compost bins .

Cheers dave.

Paddy Tobin:
Hi Dave,

I would ask: What would I do with all the garden "waste" if I didn't have a compost heap? The garden produces a huge amount of material from grass cutting, pruning, cutting down of perennials etc. etc. There is also an amount of household waste which can be composted - kitchen waste, newspapers, packaging etc. and my "art" of compost making is to heap it all up and leave it until it has rotted. The only area which needs a little care is when I have a lot of grass as this can develop into a mess if enough rough material is not available to mix through it. With a big heap I find it heats up very quickly and rots down quickly also, usable within twelve months.

Paddy

iann:
I generally find that even unshredded leaves are usable after a year, if you don't mind them being a bit coarse with some visible leaves.  Two years is very nice and three is just black powder (gold dust :)).  Anywhere you can keep them moist will work just fine.  You might want to check them at the end of winter and see if they've gone sour.  Just fluff them up to get a bit of air in.  Soon enough you'll learn how it works best, but really the only way to stop them turning in to leaf mould is to keep them completely dry.  Prepare to be amazed just how much they shrink even in one year!  Leaf mould is made primarily by fungi and doesn't heat up.

Composting is something else.  It is primarily bacterial and it heats up.  Dead leaves alone usually won't do this because they don't have enough nitrogen that the bacteria need for food.  You can have a rough usable mulch in a few weeks, and good compost in a couple of months if you turn it a few times and have a big enough pile to keep it hot.  Pile it and leave it takes longer.  I also started composting mainly to get rid of the huge amount of garden waste.  The council now supply green wheelie bins, and I might never have started composting if they'd had them sooner :o

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