I talk a lot about compost because it is an easy way to create your own nutritious soil from the waste you are creating in your home. Every household creates a great deal of biodegradable waste which is much better served in creating compost than it is in filling up landfills.
Compost reduces trash sent to landfills by more than 30%*
Plus, it’s really simple to do. So simple, in fact, I created a 4-minute video to show you how I feed and maintain my compost pile. With a little bit of time every week, you can keep your pile balanced and productive. I view compost management in 3 distinctly, simple ways:
- What to put in
- What to keep out
- Turning it over
Managing these three situations will keep your compost healthy and will allow the bacteria, worms, and insects to break down the waste into rich, organic matter.
What to Put In
I keep a sealed container on the counter to collect biodegradable, household waste in your home. You can put many things into your compost pile that you may currently be putting in your trash. I find it easiest to think in terms of colors: If it is green or brown, you can likely put it in.
Greens
Greens relates to items that contain nitrogen. Green = Nitrogen. Green items include vegetable cores, fruit peels, stems, leaves, and that gross stuff in the bottom of your vegetable drawer. Plus, it includes grass trimmings, green leaves, and other green yard waste. Don’t put weeds in there.
Browns
Brown items add carbon to your compost to balance the nitrogen. Brown = Carbon. Many brown household items can be added like tea bags, coffee grounds, filters, tissues, paper towels, plain junk mail, and plain cardboard From the yard, carbon is found in dried leaves, dead sticks, pine needles, and hay/straw. These items may be added liberally and add great aera
Mixing the green and brown items in a relative balance provides the food needed to feed the micro-community doing the work in your compost pile. If they fit one of these two categories, you can definitely add them in. There are other items you may be tempted to throw in there, but be careful. Let’s take a look at what to avoid now.
What to Keep Out
If it is not biodegradable or in either of the brown/green categories, keep it out! Meats, dairy items, oils, and other processed food wastes create multiple problems. First off, they do not break down easily which creates odors. Secondly, they bring ants and houseflies to your pile and it could encourage other rodents. None of which you want to encourage.
For this very same reason, I also do not add poop from any animal. It encourages houseflies and I do not want to breed them. I would also discourage you from adding weeds or prodigious native plant seeds to your pile. If you have a friend with woods, as I do, you can compost these items at their house.
On the topic of insects, one insect that you should allow is the black soldier fly. They are different from the common housefly and are not interested in bothering you. They do, however, love eating food waste and it makes the perfect place to lay their eggs. Do not get grossed out, it is a beautiful part of nature. They break down food waste to virtually nothing in hours and they actually crowd out regular house flies and the diseases they may carry.
Turn it Over
The third step in creating rich, organic compost is to turn over the pile every week or two, depending on the season. Do this more often when it’s warm and less often in the colder months.
Turning over your compost pile keeps everything in balance and keeps the micro-community working on decomposing your waste. Here are the benefits of turning compost in a timely manner:
- Mix the newly added material with the older compost that has been degraded
- Move the fresh material into the hottest part of the pile. You want your micro-community to stay hungry and be able to find food easily
- Re-balance the oxygen and water throughout the pile to provide a happy working environment for your microbe friends.
Let’s take a look at the video and cover all of these steps visually:
You will learn quickly when to turn the pile. The more you add, the more often you should turn it over. In the warmer months, your micro-community is in full production so you should balance things out more often to keep them happy and fed. Overall, turning more often is better than less but you definitely do not need to be doing it more than once per week.
Be Calm and Compost On!
If you want to be green, especially if you enjoy gardening, get started with a compost pile today. A pile is simple to start and maintain and you will be providing countless benefits to your backyard and the greater environment.
*According to a June 2019 study, Composting In America, conducted by the Federation of Public Interest Groups