Topic: Lawn clippings and sawdust mixture for compost?

[Galette]

Bonjour.

We seem to be quite good these days at composting most of our kitchen and garden waste, but there has always been a bit of a problem with lawn clippings.  We mulch-cut the rough areas of our large lawn, but the posher end of the garden really requires the clippings to be removed.  Yes, I know the clippings can be mixed in with other compostable waste, but (particularly at this time of year) there is insufficient going onto the compost bins to mix with - apart from lawn clippings - so back to the beginning again!  Also, we have decided that life is too short to waste it mixing up our compost...

On a rainy day the Other Half is often to be found making 'Designer Kindling' in his workshop, where he also generates lots of sawdust.  He has now come up with the idea of mixing lawn clippings with the sawdust, then chucking the resulting mix into a dedicated compost bay where it can be left for a year or two then used as compost.  His wood comes untreated, straight from the sawmill.

Any comments?

[johhnyco15]

it should be OK but maybe on the acid side which is good for blueberry's camellias just give it a pH test at the end if your worried

[galina]

Sounds a good mix of 'greens' and 'browns' and should compost nicely.  If you have a vegetable garden, grass cuttings make a good mulch around individual veg plants such as tomatoes or squash, a good sprinkling of grass over the planted potatoes is an equally good use of the clippings and saves on watering later in the year.  If you have fruit trees, they also benefit from a mulch for the same reason. 

[goodlife]

Sounds like good mix for me too.
I can never have enough grass clippings and I often send OH to mower expedition on the allotment avenues..to 'harvest' some more
I used grass clippings as mulch for so many things, this time of the year I've been mulching potatoes, not only for frost protection but as the grass rot down..it will feed the crop too
Clippings work well with most of the brassicas...and my fruit trees have had ring of grass over their root area...and and...

As for sawdust...well...one year I did have lot of it...and I used it straight on the ground as mulch. It did keep weeds abay for one summer and then some poach egg plants nearby did over seed the area...no more sawdust to be seen since..nor did it caused any problems for some raspberry canes next to the area, quite opposite. Only 'issue' with it was that it just looked little 'odd'...the light colour did stand out from the ground.

[alkanet]

bag  up leaves in the autumn and add them with grass cuttings over the summer

[Galette]

Thanks to you all for the comments.  We have recently bought an acidity - alkalinity meter so when we are ready to use this mixture we will check the ph value first.

[pumkinlover]

If using for compost the addition of a compost activator would help.
It is freely available and its use saves the water bill.