Marilyn,
In my area, the Cedar Grove company has the contract to turn yard waste and biosolids into compost. However, they mix it with so much sawdust and wood shavings that it's more like "mulch" than "compost". Not worth the price.
What I buy for "compost" is labelled somewhat ambiguously. It says "Manure" in large letters, and "compost" in small letters. It has the word "mix" somewhere in the labeling, so that it isn't clear whether they are selling a mix of manure and compost, or what. At $1.25 per 1-cubic-foot-bag, the price is right and it's light enough to get in and out of my trunk.
But my nose tells me that the manure is at least fairly well composted if not almost-completely-composted. My speculation is that they can't it by its right name ("composted manure") because then they would have to prove that they meet some standards of aging and temperature.
In my mind it's perfect: it seems to be composted "enough". The last few weeks or months of "complete" composting would deplete the nutrients, and it is already aged enough to remove almost all of the odor. I never see any problem with weed seeds, but that might just mean that I already have so many weeds that I don't notice a few extra.
The only thing I find annoying is that, if I push it through a 1/4" screen to break it up finely, I always find some fairly coarse gravel. As far as I know, cows don't have gizzards! Why should compost made from manure have gravel in it?
