In the process of brewing delicious organic fair-trade coffee, Zumi’s on Market St. in Ipswich creates a couple of 5-gallon buckets of used coffee grounds each day. In the last few years I’ve composted about a ton of this valuable by-product for use in my garden. In the summer, the mound of coffee grounds mixed with leaves can get steamy as the microbes start the process, and then hundreds of earthworms take over to finish the job.

These photos were taken at the beginning of July as summer finally arrived. Because of the cool spring, it’s also been the best season in memory for lettuce. The peas received a generous helping of the compost, and this year’s plants are almost 8′ tall! 

If no one needs the coffee grounds, Umesh takes them to a nearby organic composting facility. A typical week fills about a dozen 5 gallon buckets.