Today I finally felt up to some manual labor, so it was compost day. I harvested 3 wheelbarrows full of well composted mulch from the tumbler, which I use to finish the compost from my Earth Machine bin. I spread it under some hungry mulberry trees. Then I transferred 2/3 of the commpost-in-progress from the Earth Machine bin into the tumbler to fill it.

I had a bunch of coffee grounds/filters to add, but I have been unhappy with the way the paper filters just don't seem to break down well. I keep finding wadded-up, mostly dry filters in the midst of my otherwise moist and decomposing pile. So I shook most of the coffee out of the filters, then put the big pile of filters in a bucket with rainwater from the rain barrel. I tore them up a little by hand, then attacked them with my immersion blender! It worked beautifully. Poured the slurry on the compost.

Next I raked up the last of the leaves from the nectarine tree and put them in the bin. I picked up a bucket full of little ornamental citrus that had fallen off another tree, and since those also break down slowly if thrown in whole, I attacked them with a shovel, then a hula hoe, to make sure they were banged up a bit before tossing them into the bin.

That was fun, but now I'm sore!

--Maureen