I have alot of pine trees in my yard. Can i use the needles in the compost pile? Do I have to add anything to it to decompose?

pine needles WILL decompose, but slowly... that's why we here in the south love them for mulch.... if you want to hurry the process along, you'll need to add other greens and browns to get the pile 'cooking'.... water too.... here's a helpful site...

http://www.compostguide.com/

thank you

Trinity, pine needles, like spruce needles, are best used as mulch around plants that enjoy a slight acidity. Rhodos, azaleas, Japanese Maple et al.
They can also be mixed with soil of such plants.

Pine needles contain high amounts of nitrogen and will affect moreso soil that is sandy...less so if its clay.

The procedure for depositing into the compost pile is to gather them in a bag and wait until fall when you also bag leaves.
Then by chewing them up with the leaves, they can be safely given over to the compost.

What a lot of misinformation. Pine needles no more affect soil pH (the acidity or alkalinity) than do Maple leaves. Pine needles do test out acidic when put in some distilled water for at least 24 hours and then that water is measured by a good quality pH meter, but so does any other plant leaf including Lilacs and Roses. Pine needles can be composted and, yes, they do take longer to be digested than other plant material because of the waxy coating they have, just as whole Oak leaves will because of the tannic acid (a preservative) they contain.
If you have a lot of Pine needles you may need to add some extra Nitrogen to the mix, but that depends on the total mixture, some times I do need extra N while other times I don't.

quote:

Pine needles - Pine needles are a very good mulch, especially for acid-soil-loving plants (such as strawberries). Pine needles are light, airy, and attractive but can be a fire hazard.

http://www.cahe.nmsu.edu/pubs/_h/h-121.html

NMSU College of Agriculture and Home Economics