Oh, me aching back

My history of compost making has been to pile maple leaves and small twigs in a corner of the yard, watering it when I remembered to do so.  Over time, the pile has grown in area to about a 5' x 12' foot print.  This past fall, my helpers just added to the width and length and didn't try to pile on top of the existing pile.

Normally, the pile just sat there and broke down on its own.  Every 4-5 years, I would clean off the top of the pile and then scoop out the composted lower dark brown goodie.  This material would be screened and then put around plants (as more of a mulch).

With all this added footprint, I need to both gather the finished material and reposition the spread out pile.  Why?? because this fall there will be MORE leaves to add and there is no space.

Today I began - first pulling off all the branches that someone had piled on top of the good old material.  Then I began to screen (1/4" hardware cloth) the dark mostly decomposed bottom material.  I can see that this will take MORE than just one day - to move everything to where I want it. (Wish that I had a back-hoe instead of just a hand shovel.)

Going to black garbage-bag the screen material so that I can make MM later.

Good luck on it. My neighbor does something like what you do, but without a five-year time horizon, quite. He just keeps piling it on into a tall box with one free side, and grabs new stuff from the bottom every year, letting the higher stuff eventually collapse down and tell him when to stop.

Hope your compost is at least in a convenient area where you can work on it easily. The only place I could put a pile last year was on a steeply sloping hillside with poor access, making what is sometimes a difficult job into a worse one. This year it's such a relief to have it close, flat, and convenient instead.

Printshop messing me up again