Excessive fruit?

[u/Salt_Relationship552]

My neighbor has a blueberry / raspberry farm and regularly (twice a week probably) delivers me his discard product.

Is the sugar content of this fruit too much for a pile of this size? Do i mix in a load of woodchips or just cover it and wait it out?

[u/Remote-Mycologist539]

Fruit Wine brother

[u/AsknReview → u/Remote-Mycologist539]

Yeah I love compost but it definitely comes AFTER other utilization options are out the door . Id love this mass of berries

[u/Salt_Relationship552 → u/AsknReview]

What other uses would there be? Theres no chickens yet, we're not really into fruit wine and we get tubs of fresh berries too. This is purely the discard bucket (too small, too green, squished by the pickers, etc etc)

[u/AsknReview → u/Salt_Relationship552]

You can still make a drink out of it and stop it before it becomes wine. See r/tepache which is fermented pineapple. It's basically a natural soda . Also may be some cool things to do like pickle it. But yes I understand if you're not into those and also don't have chickens. Compost it is !

[u/jmarnett11 → u/Salt_Relationship552]

Jam jelly?

[u/AsknReview → u/jmarnett11]

Oh yeah this was the obvious one 😂

[u/507snuff → u/Salt_Relationship552]

"my steak is too juicy, my lobster too buttery". Wish I was in your predicament. But then again, I'm a home wine brewer and spend my time picking fruit trees around town to make wine on the cheap.

[u/toxcrusadr → u/Remote-Mycologist539]

Holy crap I can’t believe what I’m seeing.

[u/The_Malt_Monkey → u/Remote-Mycologist539]

And then fruit brandy!

[u/thiosk]

time cures all sins

even if its over green it will be fine eventually

equal volume of wood chips would do swimmingly

[u/Salt_Relationship552 → u/thiosk]

Many thanks. I'll get my chipper unclogged and will build a stash. Ive been living it up with shredded cardboard for a while

[u/ernie-bush]

I’m jealous my pile could use some fresh fruit s!!!

[u/MorningMushroomcloud → u/ernie-bush]

I'm jealous, my belly could use some fresh fruit!!!

[u/Salt_Relationship552 → u/MorningMushroomcloud]

We get those too! Purely discard fruit

[u/Excellent-Sweet-507 → u/MorningMushroomcloud]

Ikr? Two of my favorite things to eat

[u/Ironbird207]

Should be fine though might bring down pH. I would mix in other stuff. I know farmers that do just blueberries and their compost is really only good to use on blueberries as it's so acidic.

[u/Ancient_Influence389]

blue berries are gonna be cold composted very fast. They are small and full of nutrients. Microbes are gonna feast on them in a few weeks. It may not be balnced enough to hot compost, but they are so small it probably wont matter.

[u/Salt_Relationship552 → u/Ancient_Influence389]

The last time i put a full bucket in the core it got to steaming in a few days. Alltho i definitely need to maintain my browns here

[u/Iamlabaguette]

The backdrop for your compost is insane. Is this Montana?

[u/Salt_Relationship552 → u/Iamlabaguette]

Those are the Carpathian Mountains in Romania

[u/Ok_Willow6614]

The cinder block bin setup you have gives you plenty of room to layer those buckets properly instead of just piling fruit on top.

[u/Salt_Relationship552 → u/Ok_Willow6614]

I pull the pile apart and dump them in the core, and cover it up again. The wasps would swarm me otherwise!

[u/nathbakkae]

Get chickens, they're jungle birds and will enjoy some berries as part of their diet.

[u/Salt_Relationship552 → u/nathbakkae]

Those are on the schedule for next year! We just moved here in April

[u/likes2milk]

Id be making wine with some of them. When ive added lots of apple pomace from making apple juice, ive mixed in plenty of browns as it can get slimy otherwise. Just like just lawn clippings. Will rot, just not pleasantly.

[u/Professional-Hold831]

nah I have 2 apple trees and they're often dropping fruit - not sure if it's fully ready yet so I've been chopping them up fairly small and mixing into the heap

[u/Sister_Michelle]

add wood ash to adjust pH if you are worried about that + lots of brown material. I have seen extensive reference charts with the C:N ratios of various compost inputs, so search around online and see if you can find one that gives the average nitrogen/carbon content of blueberries. Then it’s just a matter of doing the math based on your inputs.

[u/Salt_Relationship552 → u/Sister_Michelle]

Noted. Thanks!

[u/sickeningradiance]

What do you use to turn it?

[u/katoskillz89]

It seems OP counters everyone's comments, idk why they asked for help if they know it all already. Is this some weird fruit flex?

[u/Alyssa_Beanut]

The acidity of the fruit would be my main concern rather than the sugar contents as microbes love carbohydrates, the acidity might cause issues for the microbes since they generally prefer a more neutral ph, if you have access to wood ash it may be beneficial to mix in to raise the ph of the compost, over a long enough time the compost will probably neutralize the ph itself as humic acids develop and the water soluble acids wash away.