Instructions for the Large Scale Composting of Wood Chips Into Mulch

Use a wheel barrow, rake and shovel to transport your compost materials to the location where you will use them. Compost on a large scale is easier to transport short distances.

Mow the raked leaves to shred them. Shredded leaves have more surfaces exposed to decompose at once, and compost materials will decompose faster if they are smaller in size.

Sort the materials into nitrogen-filled organic green materials and carbon-filled organic brown materials. Nitrogen-filled organic green materials include animal bedding and coffee grounds. Carbon-filled organic brown materials include wood chips and dead leaves.

Shovel the compost material into long piled rows called windrows. The windrows should be 3 feet high and 3 feet wide but may be as long as needed to contain all of your compost materials. Pile the organic green materials and organic brown materials in alternating layers through the windrow.

Soak the compost material with a garden hose so that the entire windrow remains as damp as a wrung-out sponge.

Check the windrow daily by inserting a meat thermometer into the center of the pile. The pile should heat to an internal temperature between 120 and 160 degrees Fahrenheit.

Turn the windrow over and mix the contents by shifting the contents with a shovel and rake any time that the windrow's internal temperature drops below 120 degrees Fahrenheit. The pile will gradually decompose. When there are no large chunks of material in the windrows and the temperatures no longer rise when you turn them, allow the windrow to sit and cure for six weeks. The compost will be usable at this point.