Why is my compost not turning black

[smoking shawn86]

I have been composting for a couple of years now and my compost never looks like black gold that every ones talking about. So if any one has a comment as to why it's not turning black please send my one.

 

[smoking b]

How are you composting? If you are using a compost pile the time it takes the compost to finish depends on lots of stuff such as what you put in to start with, the size of it, the carbon to nitrogen ratio you have, your moisture level etc... Too much moisture will slow the process down but so will too little moisture. If you have a pile that had been heating up but stopped after turning that could be an indication of not enough nitrogen in your mix or maybe too much water was added...

 

[smoking shawn86]

That leaves me with to many questions. My pile of compost has no problem heating up and the moister level is good the one pile I had cooked for two moths and stop heating up but still was not black it looked like a dark brown. In my mixture I use horse manure and straw.