Welcome back to another edition of Compost Corner—so glad to see you!

Almost as glad as I am to see temperatures finally dropping as we sift into autumn. (See what I did there?)

Which brings us to today’s topic: sifting.

If you’ve strolled to the back of Maple Street Community Garden lately, you might’ve noticed a brand-new addition: our shiny compost sifting table, built by the talented Lory Henning. This thing is a game-changer—two roomy tabletops with storage, a metal mesh bridge to park your wheelbarrow under, and just enough tilt so the chunky bits (aka “overs”) roll back into the bin to be recomposed. Fun fact: overs aren’t rejects—they’re compost gold when you’re starting a fresh pile. (Browns, baby.)

So how do we know it’s sifting time? The temperature has dropped! Remember a few weeks ago when we talked about phases? Compost has to cool before we can sift it. What we’re working with now is called curing compost—and there are a few easy ways to spot it besides the chill:

Color: finished compost is dark brown, like the good rich soil it’s about to become.
Looks: no more visible apple cores or wilted lettuce leaves—everything should be unrecognizable.
Texture: crumbly and uniform, like chocolate cake crumbs. (Sorry, this one’s not edible.)
Smell: earthy musk, like a walk in the woods. Never sour. Sour is the compost's way of saying, “Something went wrong, friend.”

Lugging compost around in wheelbarrows is no joke, and this table makes life a whole lot easier for the MSCG crew. More efficiency = more fresh compost for our plants and for neighbors to take home.

Why do we sift, anyway? Here are three reasons:

Quality control. Even with our best efforts, the odd sticker or pebble sneaks in. Sifting is the last check before compost hits your soil.
Happy decomposers. Worms, millipedes, and friends love those chunkier leftovers we send back to the pile. They ride them straight into your newer, decomposing greens.
New batch magic. Overs are full of microbes that spark the next pile into action.
Bonus: the tabletops double as workstations! Efficiency, but make it cute.

And if you want to give the new table a spin, you’re in luck: it makes its grand debut at the MSCG Arts Café on Saturday, September 13, from 11am to 2pm. There’ll be a Beginner Building a Compost Sifter Workshop with Compost Captain Zhenia Nagorny, plus pastries, sips, arts and crafts, and a seed burst workshop. Don’t forget your scraps, the team will be there to chop your banana peels and apple cores.

See you at the sifter, friends. That’s the soil—for now.

With grit & gratitude,

Jess Frost

MSCG Compost Committee

Sifting into Autumn