How Composting Can Quickly Reduce Your Garbage Bill and Turn Kitchen and Yard Waste into Soil Enriching Humus for Your Garden
Organic Recycling Family Style
Last week I posted an article on a new, green initiative that some communities are taking; implementing curb-side recycling of organic waste (spoiled food and yard debris) for use in giant digesters—composting units that are literally able to turn garbage into fertilizer and fuel. Exciting as this may be, this technology is still a distant dream of the future for residents of most towns and cities. But you can still do your own organic recycling on an individual level, by composting your family’s kitchen and garden waste.
Benefits of Composting
Composting you food and yard waste is a great way to reduce the amount of garbage tat you generate, while, at the same time, creating nutritious humus. Humus is what decaying organic matter, with the help of little microbe decomposers, eventually turns into, and it is absolute ‘gold’ for your garden. Adding humus to your garden soil puts back all the nutrients that garden plants take out of the soil as they grow. Enriching, also known as amending, your soil also helps it maintain the right amount of water, helping to prevent your soil from becoming too dry if sandy or water-logged if clay-based.
What Materials Can Be Composted?
It is also a good idea to add some compost inoculant to the mix. Inoculant can be purchased from many companies selling garden wares. It is a mixture of dried soil microbes that help to more quickly digest the waste. I also will frequently add earthworms to my bin. These little slimy decomposers can often be rescued from the pavement after rain and put to work in your compost, a great deal, since they work for garbage!
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This is just to announce that this article appears in a carnival blog held on 11 November 2008. This carnival is hosted by the Wiggly wigglers blog. I welcome all readers to have a browse.
Julian Pollock
Publisher OFC
You many be wondering, “Do I Need a Container to Start Composting?” Although you can certainly start a compost pile in an out-of-the way area of your yard, purchasing a commercial composter does have its advantages, and many are made of recycled plastic. There are generally two types of manufactured composters available:
Traditional plastic bins that are upright, and have slats and spaces which allow air to circulate within the container and compost tumblers that make it easy to frequently turn and mix the compost. It takes about a year for your organic garbage to be transformed into garden-enriching humus, and frequently mixing the contents of your compost bin helps to speed up the process.
That’s why the second sort, the compost tumblers are so convenient, but you do pay for that convenience, as most tumblers are at least twice the price of traditional compost bins. You will find that, whichever style you purchase, they typically come in black or some other dark color which captures heat and helps the waste break down more quickly.
Julian Pollock
Publisher OFC