How to compost sod

First, some quick housekeeping:

A lot of you have been wonderfully supportive of me in all my crazy composting endeavors, and here I keep forgetting to tell you about something I made that I think you might like: stickers!

I usually give them out as a “thank you” to my volunteers, but for the month of December, I’m going to offer them for free to anybody who chooses to upgrade to a paid subscription. (When I get the notification that you’ve become a paying subscriber, I’ll reach out to get your mailing address.) If you’re already a paid subscriber and want some, reply to this email and let me know your address.

I also archived all my editions on how to compost for the absolute beginner and put them in one place. Consider it a compost primer for those of you who have never yet proactively decayed a thing.

Now, onto sod.

Sod.

I just have one question: why? Why would we ever sod? Why would we rip out diverse, native, wildlife-supporting plants and replace them with stubby green carpets of shallow-rooted grass, held in formation by a base of plastic netting, and requiring a maximum amount of water to survive? Why would we do that? Anyway, my friend Haley asked for my help pulling the sod out of their front yard, and I obliged. The city advised that we “throw the sod in a dumpster,” which I obviously did not think was a good idea. Instead, I loaded my truck up and took those strips of crummy turf back to my garden in order to compost them.

There are a couple of things to know about composting sod:

Sod weighs a lot. It will get less heavy as it dries out, so you might want to let it sit in a pile for a few hours before you try to haul it anywhere. I hauled Haley’s sod over a few-day window, and the longer it sat, the lighter it got (thank god).

Composting sod comes with the risk that the grass will resprout from your compost. This can be avoided by making sure your compost pile gets hot enough (~140°F), and that you turn the pile thoroughly enough to ensure that any and all seeds are thoroughly incorporated. You are aiming to kill them. It can also be avoided by weeding fastidiously after you use the compost. Either option is fine.

All-in-all, though, it is perfectly fine to compost sod. In fact, please do not ever throw your sod away. Please compost it! You can do this in one of two ways: you can incorporate it into your existing compost pile or you can make a “set-it-and-forget-it” compost pile out of just the sod.

Use sod in your compost

Conveniently, sod comes in chunks. Chop them up, and layer them into your existing compost pile. Make sure you thoroughly moisten things as you go, as well as remove any netting from the sod’s base. Sod contains both carbon (soil) and nitrogen (green grass), so it’s—conveniently!—a fairly balanced add.

Make sod into its own compost pile

Put down a layer of sod, roots facing up. Wet it with a hose. Lay down another layer of sod, roots face up. Wet it. Repeat this until all of your sod is piled up. Then, cover the whole thing up with a plastic tarp, making sure to weight it down on each corner. Then, leave it alone. It will take about six months, but your sod will compost down into perfectly fine soil.

That’s all there is to it!

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