FOR YEARS MY FRIEND ANDREW, a better gardener than I by far, has been telling me the secret, but I just wouldn’t listen. Like I do, Andrew creates a lot of debris from his giant garden and nursery. “Run it over,” he said, whenever I’d complain about the daunting size of my heap. “Just run it over with your mower to pre-shred the stuff.” Well, I finally did.
Facing the overstuffed, impossible-to-manage reality of my 40-by-6-by-8-foot heap, I raked the top 2-foot layer (the still-whole stuff, like last fall’s leaves, in the photo below) onto the ground beside the pile, removed any enormous or woody pieces, got out the tractor, and performed my first act of hit-and-run composting. Wow. What a difference a drive-by makes.
In no time I had reduced the dry stuff formerly on top by probably 75 percent in volume, creating what will make a great (free) mulch (bottom photo) for rough areas like the vegetable and cutting rows. And I had gained access to the enormous volume of finished compost beneath it. (Next step: to screen that for use.)
Drive-by composting is my new favorite task, and next time I won’t wait: I’ll pre-shred the stuff when I collect it in fall, just like Andrew told me to, helping get the decomposition process off to a faster start.
Related posts:
- composting 101 HERE, IN THE COMPOST HEAP, is life and death and...
- while you’re at it: fall compost care WHILE YOU’RE AT IT TUCKING IN THE GARDEN, the compost...
- score: margaret 1, heap 0 HAS YOUR COMPOST HEAP swallowed up any of your tools,...
- buried treasure: some tips found in the heap WHILE REBUILDING A WAY TO GARDEN for the new season,...
Enjoy this feature? Don't miss anything at A Way to Garden. Sign up for Margaret's new email newsletter, and subscribe to our RSS feed.
I WAS SO BLESSED TO visit and document many of the nation’s finest homemade gardens for 15 years for ‘Martha Stewart Living,’ first as garden editor and then as editorial director. The places we were proud to publish included my own upstate New York home. Take a tour of 
{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
I love your site! As an person that is in the office and car 10 hours a day and can’t wait to get home to get dirt under my nails, feverishly working till dark, your site helps me feel that AM in my garden while at my job. Keep typing, PLEASE!!
I know this is a great idea because i did this last fall when I was picking up leaves. I ran the mower first then dumped those leaves from the bag into a pile. It worked great! I plan to get a shredder sometime in the future but the lawnmower works for now!
My husband and son have both been doing this for years. It does work and they like doing it….maybe it is a guy thing.
Welcome, Cindy. Thanks for the encouragement. I am at the computer more than I’d like, but promise to keep at it (and also to steal outside and get dirty a bit).
@ Cindee and Kathy (or Kathy’s men): I should have listened to you or Andrew all these years!
What an excellent idea!
In our last garden we had a big liriodendron with huge leaves. Using a bag mower, we saved on raking time in the fall and made the mulch so much easier to turn in the spring.
In our new home now, we’re waiting for the trees we’ve planted to get large enought to use the technique again!
What a fantastic idea. I desperately want a mulching mower with a bag attachment or a mulcher/shredder thing, but just running over the stuff with the mower sure helps a lot too.
wonderful !!! thanks for sharing :)
Gosh, what I wouldn’t give for so much compost. Got me thinking about the land we have 2 hrs. away. Lots of brown, but not so much green for composting. Any ideas about how to have long distance composting?
just a little different take, i first rake and pile into a large compost pile by the garden, then i shred using my mackissic shredder/chipper. my simplicity tractor/mower is tough, but not as tough as my mighty mac.
I never rake leaves in the fall (too daunting). I wait till the majority are on the ground and run the mower over the whole place one last time. Looks a little funny mowing in November but the result is in-place compost. All of the shredded material has worked its way to the soil by spring.
Love this site. Wish composting was more appreciated. Just ordered 3 yards from an organic farmer and had to explain to a neighbor why compost is the most important ammendment. Sometimes life would be easier if one could happy with the white rock, yews, and resin fountain landscape. Is there rehab for those addicted to perfect PH soil?
I have eliminated grass but use a leaf vacuum system in my fall clean up and yes shredded material goes down faster. My winter trick for kitchen stuff is to freeze it and when we get enough warm days so the ground is softer I just dig it in. This works now because I am preparing beds to be planted. When everything is planted, I’ll go back to my composter. Shredded material + frozen stuff and watered in: yummy soil lasagne.