Home Composting

We are bombarded every day with environmental issues such as recycling, fuel efficiency, water conservation. How does one address the situation?

In the US alone, garden and food wastes from suburban homes make up 30% of the waste stream being dumped into landfill. However, did you know that a large portion of your garbage can be recycled and reused as fertilizer? Home composting is an environmentally friendly activity and a great way to reduce your household waste. Learn about the advantages of home composting and what items you can recycle.

Instead of dumping your families’ biodegradable waste into the garbage bin and sending it off to landfill, you can compost it and divert it on to your own garden in the form of valuable humus, which is a wonderful food for your plants and flowers. It’s common knowledge that home composting provides essential additives to the soil, it not only serves as a fertilizer, but also buffers the pH levels and helps retain precious water in the garden where it’s needed. Also by keeping the surface cool, it aids in the prevention of soil erosion. This is beneficial to your pocket too, as by adding this humus you will have no need to buy topsoil again. By home composting all your families’ biodegradable waste you will have endless supplies of the best organic fertilizer you can feed to your plants, all for free.

Aside from these advantages, experts are unanimous that home composting is a good lesson for young and old alike to learn the importance of conservation. Often, gardening will prompt children to ask questions about how you achieve such great results when you are attending your veggies or flowers. You can impress on them that your home made compost offers a natural alternative to chemical fertilizers, enriches the soil, and how this benefits your garden plants, at the same time helping the environment by reducing the waste stream.

There are 4 basic necessities for home composting – nitrogen, carbon, air and water, so how do we get started and what can be recycled? Anything that’s lived before is a rule of thumb. You need a combination of green and brown material.

Greens

Nitrogen rich materials which are rapidly decomposing:

Fruit, vegetable scraps
Raw table scraps
Grass clippings – spread in layers to prevent bulking
Flower cuttings & garden plants
Young green weeds – as long as they have not gone to seed
Chicken manure – speeds up process
Green hay – spread in layers
Crushed eggshells
Vacuum cleaner dust
Tea leaves or bags
Coffee grounds

Browns

Carbon rich materials which are slow to decompose:

Cardboard– cut up
Newspaper and paper – avoid glossy paper
Leaves
Sawdust – spread in layers to prevent bulking
Wood shavings
Woody prunings – cut up small
Hedge clippings
Fallen leaves
Pine needles – acidic, use sparingly
Clean wood ash – sprinkle lightly, it is alkaline so can help adjust the pH

Do not use diseased or seed infested weeds, bones, meat, banana, orange or peach peel, pet droppings, or anything inorganic like metal, plastic or glass.

To get your home composting project off to a quick start you can add a compost activator which contains bugs which will eat and break down any organic material. Also adding garden soil will do the same.

Heat will speed up the home composting process so place your compost pile or bin in the sun. Chop or shred larger items so the bacteria can break them down quicker. Worm farms are an alternative way of home composting and turning kitchen waste into fantastic fertilizer.