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Index : Miscellaneous Gardening Topics
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- 42. A Great Time to Compost - Top
- It's a great time of year to make garden compost. Falling leaves, summer-spent garden plants, and the weeds that you've been meaning to pull, are all great materials for composting. Like baking a cake, using the right ingredients and following a few simple instructions will insure success.
The most important ingredient of compost is organic material. Leaves, twigs, chipped and shredded branches, small wood chips, grass clippings, weeds and spent garden plants are yard and garden waste that can be used. Fruits and vegetables, including peels and seeds, nut shells, coffee grounds and tea leaves are kitchen wastes that can be used. Other materials such as straw, sawdust and wood shavings, and animal manures can also be used. Do not however, add human or pet manures, meat, bones, animal fats, oils, or dairy products to compost piles.
These organic materials break down and become compost thanks to the efforts of a host of living organisms. The bacteria that goes to work in the initial stages of decomposition arrive in the compost pile on the organic matter you place there. With the proper amount of air, moisture and food source (organic matter), these bacteria thrive. And in the process of doing their work they heat up the pile to temperatures that kill pathogens, parasites and most weed seeds.
To obtain the proper heating, compost piles must measure at least 3 feet in each direction: side to side, back to back and from the ground up. The compost pile can be maintained with or without any housing. Very effective bins can be made from wood pallets, concrete reinforcing wire, or concrete blocks stacked to allow for ventilation. Commercially made bins offer various features related to looks and convenience. Whether home-made or store-bought, a bin should be sturdy and allow for drainage and easy turning. Remember that an area no less than 3 feet cubed (27 cubic feet) is required for composting.
Locate the composter in a partly sunny spot that is well drained, protected from drying winds, and near a source of running water. Remember to consider accessibility and aesthetics. Try to make it easy to get materials to and from the compost area. Though a compost pile is not necessarily an eyesore, it's not much to look at either. You may want to screen it from view.
In addition to air and water, the microbes doing the composting require a balanced diet, preferably one that contains about 30 parts carbon to 1 part nitrogen. To accomplish this it is necessary to use some materials high in nitrogen and some high in carbon but low in nitrogen. Grass clippings, weeds, spent garden plants or rotted manures, are higher in nitrogen. Fruit and vegetable waste, leaves wood shavings, sawdust and straw are very low in nitrogen.
Begin the compost pile by alternating layers of nitrogen-rich materials with those than are nitrogen-poor. Chop these materials as finely as possible. Smaller particle size of the organic materials will encourage faster composting. To insure proper inoculation of the pile with composting microbes, scatter small amounts of soil between layers of organic material. To each 3 to 4 inch layer apply water. Or, mix all the ingredients together and water. The compost material should be wet, but not so wet that you can squeeze water from it. In hot weather, check the pile daily to see if it needs more water.
Every 3 to 5 days, turn the pile with a pitchfork or shovel. Internal temperatures of the pile should reach 135 degrees. You can measure the temperature with a composting thermometer. Judging the temperature by touch is also possible. At 135 degrees the pile will be too hot to leave your hand in the center of the pile.
When the pile no longer generates any heat and its material is dark brown to black with no identifiable plant parts, the compost is mature and ready to use.
When mixed into our native soils for vegetable and flower gardening, compost works wonders. It makes the soil easier to cultivate, aerates and improves drainage, improves root growth, reduces alkalinity, and reduces soil pests such as nematodes. With all these benefits it's little wonder garden composting has become so popular.
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Written by John Begeman, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, the University of Arizona, 520-626-5161.
Material originally appeared in Arizona Daily Star gardening column, on December 14, 1997
- Updated: February 22, 2001
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