never ready

I have 2 composters. One tumbles, the other stacks. The "stuff" in the tumbler never seems to cook properly. I'd like to empty it and start again. Can I use this "stuff" as is and till it into at least on veggie plot?

I would. I have the same problem with my tumbler -- it "finishes" into weird baseball-sized pellets that aren't fully broken down. I consider it rough compost and have used it in my vegetable garden without any problems.

Good to hear that. Mine doesn't even smell good!

The stuff in my tumbler doesn't smell like it should, ie pretty much no smell, but I've gotten it to be OK after some trial and error.

The first couple of batches I made I was very careful with. I compost all my food garbage (except meat & dairy) in it and I made sure to add straw for the brown and to turn it. It had no smell and worked fine (except for the pellet thing -- it just never pours out as pristine as it does in the company's pictures!).

Then I guess I got cocky. I wasn't diligent about adding straw and didn't turn it much, and it turned on me! It got smelly and gross. I dumped it all out (put the contents in the garden anyway), rinsed it out and started again, this time doing as I'd done originally plus adding some soil to get it started on the good microbe path.

Since then, it's been much better, though still not as scent-free as it was those first couple of times. That'll teach me! Or not......

Today I borrowed a friend's pick up truck and went to a nearby farm and the farmer's bucket truck in about 2 minutes loaded up the truck bed with 2 y.o. horse and cow manure. Looking at that huge, easily acquired pile of gold made me feel a little silly for fussing with my compost, given the tiny quantity I get. OTH, I am able to compost all my food scraps. At a minimum, my trash smells better on the way to the dump!

Just use the unfinished compost as a mulch, don't till it in.

Karen

Ive used a compstumbler for 15 yrs. Iam so suprized that your compost dosent smell nice,Iam really kind of haphaz at it most of the time,allthough we do turn it dailey when its nice out !!! that just shocks me ,I have gotten a few little balls once in a while,I added some blood meal recently to get it cooking ,its been really cold spring here. We just moved it to a full sun location,as it sat in a lot of shade ,we are hoping to speed it up a bit,because it was slow,but it worked in the shade.I do love the earthy smell when you open it.!!! P.S. make sure that manaure is fully composted,weed seed ,I was told oh its great,and old,well I got nettel,jimson,chickweed,it was awful,good luck

Here's a link comparing Aerobic - vs - Anaerobic compost piles:

http://www.rivenrock.com/composttypes.htm

I once read that nothing will grow in anerobic compost, but I don't know how accurate that statement was.