Black Gold

One simple photo, so many thoughts!

This photo shows a young Hellebore in my back shade bed. It has a bud about to unfurl.

Looking at this photo my first thought is that I need to get the leaves off the plants in this garden. But wait, there's also a second strong though. Look at all that black gold!

Black gold is what some gardeners like to call compost. These leaves haven't composted enough to be black and crumbly but they are still valuable. I will be careful when cleaning these beds and all these nicely broken down leaves will be added to the compost heap.

Don't bag up and give away your black gold!

Melanie

Do you Sift your Compost?

What does this photo have to do with today's topic of sifting compost? Absolutely nothing but I figured I needed to start off with something cute since the rest of the photos are blah.

This is my compost area. This is a nice photo of my compost area. Trust me...and yes, that is a toilet in my compost, oh the shame.

This photo was taken last year, this year the compost has spread to the left and to the right and there's hardly any place left to even walk. That's ok, I'm working on making some serious compost!

My husband Don made this sifter for our garden at our first house. Back then we were on a quarter acre lot and didn't have a compost pile.


Two weeks ago Don replaced the screen for me. See how nice he made it so that it fits perfectly on top of the wheelbarrow?

I have to wonder though, do I need to go through the extra step of sifting my compost? I know that when you get composted delivered, you pay extra for the kind that's "triple screened". But what about at home?

Do you sift your compost?