Garden On, Vashon

Nearly always this time of year, a high pressure system moves over the region as the Jet-stream purshes north, granting us a long period of gloriously sunny days. It’s happened so often that I’ve come to call it “The January Thaw.” 

At True Value today, I had to wait for my single sack of potting soil because the guy in line in front of me ordered 20. Kevin wanted me to know about their upcoming class on seed-starting. At yoga, Karen accosted me, wanting to talk Garden Tour. The urge is ON.

The Thaw is a little late this year—as it was last year—but oh SOOOOO welcome whenever it arrives. It’s a great time to do hardscape projects and end-of-winter clean-up. I chose to spend it making a new compost pile.

Building a new compost pile

 I’m writing a chapter on “All The Ways We Compost” here on the Island, and it felt hypocritical to write about it and not be DOING it. When I was interviewing Rob Peterson of Plum Forest Farm about his composting facility, he said “now if I could get leaf mold, I’d mix with okara—THAT would make a good compost.”

Seed, planted.

Leaf mold, I have: two wire-bins full, gathered, mowed, and stored last autumn for whenever I next needed brown material for composting. And I knew the Tofu Factory piled its okara—the after-product of tofu production—behind its factory. So off in the truck loaded up with buckets and pails went I, on the hunt for compostables.

When I first wrenched my shovel from the wet muck of okara, my first thought was “vanilla milkshakes gone sour.” The stuff handles like a shovelful of west-side snow: heavy, melting, grainy. I could barely lift a 5-gallon bucket into the truck. But I’d been told that Langley Fine Gardens tills this stuff by the truckload into their garden beds, as it’s rich with nitrogen. They use it at Kay White’s garden, too. “Just be ready to till it into your soil IMMEDIATELY,” I’d been warned.

On to my favorite source of horse manure, which Sam and I scooped by the black bucketful. This time of year, the horses are eating their grain + vitamins, timothy hay, and if overweight, a lunch of Island hay. “We consider it diet food, as it has a lot less nutrient in it than timothy—or that’s what the owner says,” Sam the stableboy told me. Plenty of fiber in those “apples”—or just as much carbon as nitrogen. 

Back home, I had to make space by emptying the lowest bin.  So I sat Bob’s Over-A-Barrow Compost Sifter over my wheelbarrow, scooped 3-4 shovelfuls of rough compost into the sifter and shook shook shook it. 4-5 sifters-full later, I had a barrow full of fine-textured finished compost, and an empty bin ready for the many layerings and waterings that a new compost pile requires.

Friday, its core temperature was 40°. Four days later, it’s 70°. Perhaps we’ll reach the pathogen- and weed-seed kill zone of 120°. Perhaps not. 

Meanwhile, when the rain returns, here’s a great indoor project for you or your local handy-person to create. Bob’s Over-a-Barrow Compost Sifter is easily made from cedar fence planks, 1/2″ hardware cloth, about 5′ of PVC pipe, some screws and building staples (the kind you pound in with a hammer). You figure out your dimensions based on the size of your own wheelbarrow (and I hope your barrow is one that sits high: it’s work enough to shake the sifter without also bending over double.) If you have any questions, please email me at karendale@centurytel.net.

Happy Thawing!