Composting: Good for Plants and the Planet
Composting is a relatively simple and inexpensive way to turn your kitchen scraps and yard cuttings into beneficial mulch. For very little time, effort, and money, you can produce nutrient-packed compost that benefits your garden, reduces the volume of garbage sent to landfills, and is said to be a much better alternative to chemical fertilizers. Compost is an all-natural way to aerate and improve your soil, increase the soil’ water retention, and stimulate the root development of your plants.
What makes compost?
Compost consists of any organic plant material that decomposes. Composting mirrors the process that takes place in natural settings such as forests, where plants die, settle to the forest floor, decompose, and are dismantled by microorganisms. When the various organisms and microorganisms finish their process of breaking down the organic plant materials, what’ left is the dark, rich, and loamy compost that plants love.
Household food scraps such as corncobs, citrus rinds, coffee grinds, coffee filters, eggshells, dryer lint, vegetable peels, grass cuttings, hay, and manure all make great compost ingredients. If you use manure in your compost, choose the droppings from vegetarian animals such as goats, horses, cows, ducks, sheep, and pigs. Avoid using milk and fish products, fats, grease, and dog and cat droppings; these items often contain pathogens, slow or destroy the decomposition process, and attract vermin to your compost pile.
Balance your compost ingredients
In composting, the goal is to create an environment in which the natural decomposition of organic materials speeds up through the use of green materials, brown materials, moisture, and air. Successful composting strikes a balance between materials that produce nitrogen and others that produce carbon.
- Fresh green materials like leaves, grass clippings, and pine needles produce nitrogen.
- Brown materials like coffee grounds, dead leaves, twigs, corncobs, and cardboard produce carbon.
A mixture of brown and green materials yields the best results.
Composting methods
The composing process can be as simple and cost free as establishing a pile in your yard, away from your house, or more costly and elaborate as buying a specially made composting bin or constructing a wood-and-wire structure. Whichever method you choose, be sure the site is level and has good drainage and airflow.
- Composting on the ground. If you build your compost pile on the ground, be certain to place it over the soil, not on cement. This way, the organisms in the soil can travel back and forth between the soil and the compost heap. Make your compost pile at least 3×3×3 feet.
- Composting in a bin. Great low-cost composting bins are available at many gardening stores or you can also make your own bin. A little research will help you figure out which option is your best bet.
Composting tips
- Keep it warm. For the fastest rate of decomposition, try to keep the temperature within the compost heap between 104° and 160°F. You can purchase an inexpensive compost thermometer to test the heat in the pile or you can monitor the heat by feeling it with your hand. If it’ warm to the touch, the pile is probably doing well. If the pile feels cool or the same temperature as the air outside, it likely needs more heat. To increase the heat in the pile, add more green materials, such as grass clippings, that will produce more nitrogen.
- Choose a good location. Heat helps the microorganisms work faster, makes the materials decompose quicker, and kills weeds within the pile as well as plant diseases living on the materials. If you live in a cooler climate, locate your compost bin in a sunny spot so it can trap solar heat. But if you live in a warm climate, pick a semishady spot for your compost pile so the material doesn’ dry out too quickly.
- Make sure it stays moist. Moisture aids the composting process by helping to break down the materials. Try to keep the materials in your compost pile as damp as a wet cloth that has been wrung out. Too much moisture, however, can cause an inordinate amount of odor as the materials break down and can ultimately slow the decomposition process because the water will replace the air in the mixture.
- Turn to help with aeration. Hand-turning your compost pile daily with a pitchfork or garden fork ensures that enough air is circulating within the pile and lets you check the moisture level of the pile. For example, moving the materials from the edges into the center gives you an even decomposition rate. Also keep in mind that as materials decompose they shrink. Make sure to add new materials to the pile throughout the process and mix them into the pile.
Results
Depending on how you maintain your compost pile, several weeks or months later you will have a dark, earthy, and crumbly compost mixture. Your compost will provide your plants with lots of nitrogen and vitamins, and it will also be an excellent soil conditioner. Spread the compost around the base of your plants in a 1-inch-thick swath and watch your plants thrive.
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I want to start composting this year. I’ve saved all of my dead leaves from last fall, and I’ve recently begun saving my kitchen waste. Any suggestions for getting started on a small budget?
I live in the city and my yard is all concrete. There is a salami factory near by that has plasic barrels casings come in. I cut them in half after washing them and use them to grow everything. I cut vent holes in one to make my composter. It works very well
I too have been compositng for 20 years its part of my recycling.
I have been composting as long as I remember. It not only is a easy way to use the natural peeling,coffee grounds, or egg shell it’s less trash to take to the curb.
I have been composting for years. It’s all that we use to feed our garden and plants. We love picking fresh produce from our garden and all of the plant scraps go right back to the composting pile to feed next year’s crop.
I have 2 kids 2 and 1 and live in the city and we have composted for over a year now. We vermicompost which is to say “worms eat our garbage”. We use rubbermaid totes and feed the worms 2x a week from the 5 gallon pail under our sink. Our kids are totally involved and love to feed the baby worms. Last year we used the castings and the “tea” from the bottom of our containers to nourish small gardens that were beautiful! This year we will be able to fortify a bigger garden and give some away, along with the worms- they do multiply. Ican’t express enough what an incredible lesson/gift we have given to our kids. It is sooo cheap. Incidentally the book “Worms eat my garbage” is a own and dirty resource that answers all the questions and tells you how to get started.
If you happen to throw ‘weeds’ in your compost, make sure they haven’t already gone to seed. If your compost doesn’t get hot enough to kill them, they’ll sprout in your garden after you work the compost in, making more work for you! :-(
My folks always composted, so it’s a very natural process for me. Every spring, we take what’s in the compost ‘barrel’ and till it into the garden. I keep a recycled plastic shortening can by the sink to put coffee grounds and veggie peelings in. When it’s full (or before) we put it in the big compost bin. The lid helps keep any fruit flies from developing and becoming a pest. Compost ‘bins’ can be made out of many things – one time my father recycled an old hot water heater by laying it horizontal, making two brackets to fit each end into, and used pieces of pipe to put in the ends for spindles for it to rotate on. He cut an access door into it with a torch, and put an ‘x’ of 2 pcs of 2×4 on one end for a ‘handle’ to use to turn it on it’s axis. I think there were also some ventilation holes on the end. It kept everything well contained and was very easy to mix your ingredients :-). A smaller, 20 or 30 gal. tank would work great for someone with smaller needs.
My wife and I have been composting at our new old house for a few months now. We don’t have any fancy stuff just a hole in the ground but I go out everyday and add the coffee grounds from my coffee and every few days we add things from the “leftovers” It’s working great and has really sped up!
Message for Shelby:
You can compost in a bin. Thats what I use. Go to The Garderners Supply Website. They have many sizes for different lifestyles. I’m sure you will find something to fit your needs. Good Luck.
My husband and I have been composting for many years. This year I started putting in my shredded paper…clean white easily shredded paper. I also dig up some worms around and put them in too. I get great results and our produce is superb when we add compost. This year my husband is growing summer squash right on top of a compost pile. Happy composting everyone!
I have often wanted to compost but never got started on it. This year I’m doing it!! In getting started I have learned that you need a good ratio of ingredients which are 1/2 brown(Carbon)to 1/2 green (Nitrogen). This can help to remember 3 bags of leafs to 1 bag of grass clippings. your pile also needs air circulation, and moisture (should be like a rung out sponge). Keeping your material cut up as small as possible helps the process break down faster.
I have taken an area Master Gardener Course and learned an awful lot…it is awesome and I suggest more people get involved..Good composting…
For Eath day we started a compost hole in the back yard. It’s about 1 1/2 by 3 feet. I didn’t know I could add the lint from the dryer that was a great tip Thanks Kashi!!
Composting is an awesome thing. I have been composting almost all of my adult life. I composted a corner of my yard that was the low spot. Over a course of about 8 years, I raised the soil level about 12” in an area of about 8’X8’X8’. The affect on the errosion was tremendously positive. I now live in a totally different region, in another home, and have started a similar compost in 2 places. It is a shame to see people put natural waste (grass clippings, leaves, etc)into plastic bags to be schlepped to the landfill. I keep a small pail on the kitchen counter to collect my peelings and such to add to the compost heap.
I grew up with my mom composting, and I can say with certainty that growing up doing it has made it habitual. If you have kids, get them in the habit. It’ll stick!
My father has been maintaining a compost pile for many years now. You’d be surprised how much grass clippings and tree leaves have been added to that 6-foot cubical space behind the garden in the past 15 years. He never has to empty it into those big bags for the trash guys to pick up, he just buries it and by the next year it’s gone. Composting should be practiced worldwide.
I found this interesting step-by-step guide to indoor composting:
http://www.nyccompost.org/how/wormbin.html
Looks like something that would definitely work on a deck.
Anyone have any suggestions for composting in the city. We don’t have yard access but we have a deck.