I think that the production of compost has to be one of the nearest things to magic that exists in the world.
I was lucky enough that upon moving into my house, nine months ago, the previous owners left two almost empty compost bins behind in the garden. Ever since then I've been adding my raw vegetable scraps, tea bags, coffee and the odd bit of paper and cardboard too. One of the bins had filled up by late last year, and except for a bit of turning with a fork, I've left it be since. This week, I opened it up to see what was going on inside.
And wow, all those onion peel scraps and carrot heads have completely dissapeared. There wasn't a single tea bag in sight. Instead - and to be honest I wasn't really expecting the whole thing to work - was some rather good looking brown compost, all evenly mixed up!
Until now I've been buying compost to add to the soil in my vegetable patch but this was an opportunity too good to waste. So this evening, taking advantage of the ever increasing hours of daylight, I knocked together a compost sieve out of some old wood and a bit of mesh (instructions here), and started sieving the compost out into the wheelbarrow.
The result... lovely fine warm compost.
Considering that this stuff costs a fair bit of money at the garden centre, this is a rather cool way of getting it for free I think!
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I've been working on my
I've been working on my compost for a few months now. I inherited an almost full compost bin that had been filled with grass cuttings, leaves and branches. Not nearly enough wet stuff and packed too tightly. Zero compost production.
I've been adding wastes and trying to balance the green and the brown and doing a bit of watering to keep it moist. Shoveling out from the bottom and mixing it at the top to get things going.
I don't have a vegetable patch and our garden is pretty well established and as a renter I don't want to mess with the landlords setup too much so I am not totally sure what I will do with the compost once I am done.
Any tips on how to mix into a flower garden that it is already planted?
Hi Stephen, Thanks for the
Hi Stephen,
Thanks for the comment. I am by no means an expert at this stuff - I'm just getting going myself really. But I know that you can use compost as a mulch to retain the water and also suppress weeds around your flowers. The basic idea is that you just spread it over the soil around the plants (or all along the border) on top of the soil. The worms will probably do a pretty good job of mixing it all up over time and providing your plants with the nutrients.
As for the compost bins, they do always say that a bit of "activator" (i.e. urine) is good for getting the process going!
Pete.
I've never lived in one
I've never lived in one place long enough to harvest my compost but I've always had one when I can. The urine thing is fascinating and adds a wonderfully primal aspect to the process, giving you a real connection to your gardening. Just don't tell people when they're eating your veg...
Nice one! When I first tried
Nice one! When I first tried making compost it was a spectacular disaster --- I just created a heap of stinking slime. I hadn't realised that cooked stuff was a no-no. Mind you, it came good in the end. I mixed a lot of paper and card in, and capped it with soil.
I have a bokashi bin thingy, which I keep in the kitchen and to which I can add just about anything, in theory (cooked stuff is fine, as is meat). There is a mild bit of faff, you add some bran that's impregnated with yeasts and bacteria, and the stuff sort of pickles/ferments. It's most odd. A liquid drains off (the bin has a tap) that they suggest you use as liquid plant food, or as a sort of cleaning product (I don't clean with it). It's gone wrong once, when it seemed to rot rather than ferment. Once it's full, you leave it to ferment more for two weeks or so, and then either dig a trench and bury it, or add it to the compost heap.
I'm not fully convinced it works better than just composting what you can. The reason I am trying it is that I liked the idea that it would take everything.
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