Pine needles & kudzu?

After putting together my initial compost pile (including quite a few pine needles, as I'm drowning in them over here!), I read about the acidity of pine needles... I panicked a bit, since my soil is already on the acidic side - should I do anything to amend the acidity of the pile, or will it sweeten up naturally, with decomposition?

Also, I'm at war with the kudzu growing on the back of my house/garage/fence right now, but I've been hesitant to throw those evil vines into the pile... I don't have a shredder, so I've just been using some old pruners to chop up anything "big" that's going in - should I keep the kudzu out of my compost pile? Thanks!!

I always use large amounts of needles shredded and whole in all of my compost. They break down slowly and add to the soil structure over a long time. There are few plants that require you to ammend acidity. Grass is one. What is your PH? Wood ashes work well in buffering the acidity. I am just slightly acidic so I don't use much ashes. No Kudzu here so don't know.

The pH is 6.0 - so not too acidic, but I wasn't sure if I wanted to add additional acidity or not...

Well that is acidic so I would look for some wood ashes to mix on the pile. Use 1 gallon of ashes to a cubic yard of compost. Then as it is done cooking check the PH and let me know. This is 2 X what I use in 6.8PH. Pine needles are not that bad for acidity so use what you have and compost it. I compost my Pine Cones (Ponderosa) and use them to and soil structure over a long time. My worms love soil structure and can travel much deeper to vermicompost my soil with the sticks, needles, and stems I don't chop up too small.

-check out How to Grow World Record Tomatoes by Charles Wilber

He uses shredded kudzu in his compost and that is his secret for growing unbelieveable tomatoes and other vegetables.

One thing for sure, if you live along the Gulf Coast and can use Kudzu in your compost, you should never run out of the basic ingredient.

Louisiana has problems with water hyacinths clogging up their waterways and inland ports. They spend millions each year dredging and building huge piles of that stuff alongside the waterways. The thought crossed my mind that that stuff might make a good compost material but then I remembered an enterprising plywood company got a brainstorm when they saw those huge piles of fiberous material, thinking they could grind it up, mix it with glue, and press it into 4x8 foot sheets in the same manner as they made particle board. Stress and strength tests were real good so they decided to build a test house for demonstration purposes in Baton Rouge. Everything looked just great the first year but the second year the house started sprouting......and sprouting......and sprouting. :) Not even the chemicals in the glue and high temperatures and tremendous pressure used to form the sheets could kill those seeds.

This might be a dumb question, but is there anyplace you can *buy* wood ashes? Our fireplace is this pathetic little thing in our living room that we never use (not to mention I don't want ash all over the furniture!), and all I have in the bbq grill is self-light charcoal ash (not good for compost, I imagine)...

Okay... if I can use that kudzu, then I MUST buy a leaf shredder of some kind. I just started some peppers from seed a few weeks back, and am going to tomatoes next (need to check out that book!). We just moved into this house a few months ago, and the person living here before us didn't *ahem* maintain the yard very well... let's just say I have my work cut out for me with those evil vines...

Drive up to Montana in July and you will have forests burning everywhere. Buy a trailor and haul back a life time supply. Summers in Montana are hard on the forests. Good luck.

Wow... not too many fires happening around here right now (or most times, for that matter) - we've had a ton of rain recently, not to mention the ubiquitous blanket of sauna-like humidity that hangs overhead!

I am guessing that kudzu is very high in nitrogen,and since it grows from a tuber lesson's the chance of propagating,when useing it for compost.I've never tried to root any,may be a law aganist it in Ga.The reason I noticed the N content,is getting manure from a local barn,I noticed that the manure seemed "different",and was told that he had turned the heffers loose in a kudzu field,and I rellish that.So'I would guess that shreadded kudzu,and pine needles would make a good combination.I look for a site where it has been logged to get the pine bark,and run it through my chipper,then mix it with cow manure,and that is good.Mike

I've read that pine needles start out acidic, but as they decompose they neutralize. There's a thread of mine about it in Texas Gardening. I'd "hyperlink" it but I have no idea how.

Ann

all carbon breakdown becomes acidic and it becomes what ever chemically is present to interact with the Hydrogen Ion to become. Alkaline soils have much Calcium salts to become neutral. But there is still material to make plant. I think the plants that like acidic soil just use the material chemically in their roots to uptake acidic carbon quicker than plants that take up carbon in a neutral form. Organic chemistry was fun but all those benzene radicals were boring. Well unless they were in the process of making alchol. Hee Hee