Topic: Red clover and compost

[Bjerreby]

Does anyone have experience composting red clover?

Last year I sowed half my garden as a wildlife meadow, with 5 kinds of grasses, fiddleneck, salad burnet, birds foot trefoil, and red clover.

Very soon I was swamped by fiddleneck, but this year, the clover has absolutely taken over the meadow. So this morning I have chopped it all down to about 5", and built a compost heap that is 70% clover, 20% dry seaweed, and 10% mixed kitchen waste with some woody bits and cardboard. I expect with all that nitrogen in the pile I won't need to add a starter...........any ideas?

The compost heap has filled the compost bin right up, 8' by 3' by 4', and I still have about 15 barrowloads of red clover clippings to deal with. I shall have a go at making liquid fertilizer with some, use some as mulch, and dig some into my last 3 veggie beds (which I just dug fo the first time).

[saddad]

Not tried it myself but should be fine...  :-\

[tonybloke]

I add clover to my compost heaps, but not in that large a percentage!!
It will break down quickly, it's a pity you don't have some high carbon stuff to add (shredded cardboard / straw / shredded paper)
;)

[Bjerreby]

I add clover to my compost heaps, but not in that large a percentage!!
It will break down quickly, it's a pity you don't have some high carbon stuff to add (shredded cardboard / straw / shredded paper)
;)

I've mixed in old dry eelgrass. It washed up last autumn, and after our warm, dry April, it is almost like straw.

[Bjerreby]

Well here we are, 4 days on, and the compost heap has reached 45 degrees C according to my thermometer. The pile has already settled about 6".

So much for a mystical mix of yarrow, nettle, dandelion and honey to get the thing warmed up!

[Bjerreby]

DAY 10

Well, the heap has shrunk to just 60% of its original height. The maximum temperature was 61 degrees C two days ago, and this morning it was cooling down. I decided to dig in it a bit.

There wasa slight smell of ammonia, and I am told that indicates all oxygen is used up in the pile, so it is time to aerate the thing.

I pulled all the compost out with a fork, and re-piled it again, to get air in. The contents are just slightly moist, and much of it has a white powdery covering, what I understand is a good sign. It looks mostly like half-finished compost!

The only clover I can still recognize is that round the egdes of the heap, and that has now been put in the middle.

The brown corrugated cardboard I put in has completely disappeared along with the kitchen waste, brown paper and the seaweed.

If it continues like this, I shall have finished compost in another month's time....................that will free up the compost box for a hedge clipping pile  :)

So much for mumbo-jumbo quick start concoctions of yarrow, dandelion, nettles and honey!

By the way, I made liquid fertilizer from the left-over red clover. I smelled like sewage and it looks like my potatoes loved it!

[Plot69]

Clover is used as a green manure, it's sold in garden centers as such. Sow it in autumn, dig it in in spring. It's excellent for composting.

iPhone.

[Bjerreby]

DAY 11

Turning the pile worked wonders. It has heated up again, and has visibly shrunk further. It is now just half the original size........in just 11 days.  :o

[grannyjanny]

Hi Pjerreby. Do you have a special compost bin thermometer please. I would love to know if ours is heating up.
Janet

[Bjerreby]

It is an industrial instrument I bought for my work. Ahlborn mess-und regelungstechnik GmbH. www.ahlborn.com (if they still exist!).

It was expensive because it measures between -70 and +500 degrees C. I think a simple glass thermometer would do the trick.

[Robert_Brenchley]

Wouldn't that plastic insulation burn long before it reached 500 Centigrade?

[woppa30]

You only put the end of the thermocouple in, not the whole thing  :o

I like the hand thermometer, if its warm, its body temp, if its hots and steamy its getting towards 50-60.

[Bjerreby]

Wouldn't that plastic insulation burn long before it reached 500 Centigrade?

The probe is at the end of the stainless steel rod. It gets poked into a tiny hole in a ship's exhaust pipe to measure the exhaust gas temperature inside. There are other locations it works too, like at the turbochargers. I also find it handy for getting the temperature inside a bundle of cables.  :)

[Robert_Brenchley]

That explains it; the wire wouldn't be exposed to the heat.