I turned my compost pile for the first time a few days ago. Well, okay, it took two days. It was primarily bermuda hay, fresh grass clippings, and kitchen waste. I watered each layer lightly as I put it on. It took about 3 weeks to get it to a good size of 4x5 and 3.5 ft high. I let it cook for a month before I turned it. When I turned it it was cooking at 120, but I really wanted to get the covering of hay on the inside. This pile was built on the ground, not in a bin.

The things I am concerned about are:
1. It seemed wet. It had a cow field smell, but I know the guy I got it from has beef cows.
2. There were matted layers. Especially the grass layers. They were so matted and white with mold that they held together like a piece of cardboard. It reminded me of making paper. Some of the hay layers were stuck together, too.
I broke them up the best I could.
3. The veggies were unrecognizable, but the hay and grass were very recognizable.

Is this normal? I put some molasses tea and dug some soil from the woods to put in between several of the layers.

Is there anything else I should try as my next pile is growing.

Thanks for any suggestions with my compost. I live surrounded by woods. Should I go in and just start raking and add that? How about all the weeds that surround the property where we can't mow? Do you think I need to get some real cow, horse, or chicken manure? I am a little afraid of that due to the e. coli, etc.

The matting is normal if those layers are too thick. Grass always is like this. I try to fluff the stuff with my fork while turning to mix all ingredients a little better. Sounds like you are off to a good start.

The material matted together and the "cow field smell" which suggests to me a manure like odor, a putrid odor, strongly indicates you have material that is too wet, and as you said it seemed wet. Compost only needs to be just barely moist. If you have available dry material mix that into what you have and do not add more water for a while.

Horse manure is TERRIFIC!!! And with the output from 6 horses, I should know - lol!! Same goes for chicken manure.

When it's all properly & thoroughly composted, you have no more risk of contracting something evil from your home-grown vegetables than you would without it.

As for your matted grass, it needs to be mixed in better initially with other dryer ingredients. Even when "cooking", a compost pile shouldn't have an unpleasant odor.

It sounds to me like you did a great job with your first compost.

I'm not sure what a cow field smell is, but I think if it was the nasty anaerobic smell of a too wet compost it might be called sewer smell, which is way worse than cow field. If there's excess nitrogen you can get an ammonia smell (ammonia = NH3). You could fix that with some dry leaves or ground litter from those wonderful woods. Those woods are a great resource, so yes, I would rake . It's hard to get enough browns in the summer, so my summer composts are always too green (faint ammonia smell).

You'll always have some materials that take longer to break down to unrecognizable, that's why your veggies are gone but the hay still looks like hay. It all gets digested eventually.

Grass always mats if there isn't anything mixed with it. You don't need manure but it's a good addition. I never have access to manure and my compost is beautiful . The e coli isn't a threat if your compost cooks, which at 120 it sounds like it does. Keep it hot. When my compost cools I add some grass clippings to charge it up again.

An "unpleasant odor" is fairly subjective, but stink is stink lol. Sometimes I get truckloads of grass clippings from kids who mow lawns. I let the clippings cook for several weeks. Grass clippings have a definite smell! Most people would call it an awful stink but I kind of like the smell. It smells like summer to me. Mulch on the burner lol.

Sounds like you're doing great. Keep up the good work.

Thanks so much for the suggestions and encouragement, y'all.

The cow field smell is the smell of faintly fresh and dried manure like when you are walking in the field with cows, but definately not amonia-like. If I had picked up some and squeezed I don't think it would have produced water, but it would have remained stuck in a ball.

I thought my hay was considered a brown, but maybe it is an in between and I should get some really brown leaf stuff from the woods.

I feel like I could spend all day every day just getting stuff for my compost and still not have enough. Thanks goodness for my giant round bale of hay, it sure has made the compost go faster since I know I won't spend that much time on it.

Hay is always a "green" because of the high protein (Nitrogen) content.

I completely disagree. Hay is not "always" a green. Not at all. "Greens" & "Browns" have to do with moisture content - nothing else.

While freshly cut hay that has a relatively high moisture content can sometimes be considered as a "green" (or a "tween", as I call something that wavers between the two), properly cured/dried hay is a "brown".

As a longtime horse owner/breeder - I know my hay, & except for legume types like alfalfa, mixed-grass types are very low in protein. I know this for a fact because I have had my different hay types analyzed.

I agree with Breezy on this one. Hay is a brown, especially old hay.

My hay is golden, it came in a round bale about 5' by 5'. The farmers around here mostly grow Bermuda grass hay. I thought it was straw for a while. There is a little mold in there as well as some pale green, but mostly golden yellow. Is this a brown or a 'tween?

To me that would be a "brown". (And with that "little mold in there", you're not feeding that to horses, are you? )

No, Breezy, I would never! Just feeding it to my compost piles. You can't imagine how excited I was to get that giant bale of hay delivered to my compost area last May. Now it is about half the size it was.

Everything that I've ever read about composting (except for one comment here) says "greens and browns" are all about carbon and nitrogen. Nothing else.

Moisture has nothing to do with it. You can dry you grass clippings, coffee grounds and manure and soak your wood chips and it won't change a green to a brown and a brown to a green.

Wayne