There's a little bit of everything in our compost. Shortly after the first of the year we had an ice storm and some of the fallen branches were tossed in there and set on fire. The rest of the branches were taken down the hillside so that they would help cut down on erosion. Maybe in another twenty years or so the backyard will be a little bit more level.
Here's a list of what gets tossed into the compost pile:
Egg shells, coffee grounds along with the filter(don't know how well the filters will compost), parts of the fruit that doesn't get eaten, veggie peelings, shredded paper, used tea bags(don't know how well those will do either), leaves, small branches, ashes from the grill, old dirt from houseplants, dead foliage, and whatever else can go in there without attracting varmints. We have cats to help keep them away just in case.
We normally wait until the spring time to rake the yard. There are still some leaves on some of the trees that refuse to fall off the trees until then. The leaves also kind of give my flower beds a little bit of covering from the elements of winter.
The dirt in the compost pile is a lot higher than the picture shows. It looks good until you take the shovel and turn it than you see the yucky red clay that is under it. You can tell that it is good soil. There were a lot of bugs in there earlier this year. Lots of sow bugs or rolly pollies as some people call them. We have lots of worms in there too. Saw some good sized Night Crawlers the last time I turned the compost. Saw some other kinds of bugs that I really don't want hanging around, but you just can't help that unless you spray....and spraying surely isn't good for the good kind of bugs.
