Steaming Winter Compost Piles

Posted by Jamie McIntosh Feb 16, 2008

This morning I went out into the frigid February weather to drop several day’s worth of compost scraps into my compost bin. It’s a slow time of the year for gardening around here, but I feel like I am Doing Something when I make this trek to my bin. I lifted the lid and dropped in banana peels, apple cores, a stray paper plate, and copious amounts of coffee grounds and tea bags. I hesitated before lowering the lid, scrutinizing the pile that seemed unchanged from the last three visits. Suddenly, I let out a small gasp as I realized the steam I observed was not my own breath, but emanated from the pile. Was I such a master compost-maker that my pile was creating steam on this 15-degree day? Before I ran inside to enter a self-congratulatory note in my garden journal, I realized that I had just deposited a scalding hot pile of coffee grounds fresh from the coffee maker into my bin.

To keep your compost pile active during the winter, continue layering vegetable scraps and leaves in the bin. Keep the pile moist, and turn it occasionally to bring oxygen into the interior. If you have at least one cubic yard of compost in a black bin in a sunny part of the yard, perhaps you will be lucky enough to see steam wafting from the pile.