Compost is organic materials that have rotten down to leave a fluffy, soil-like substance that is incredibly nutritious for plants. Compost can be brought in single small bags or large bulk bags from DIY and gardening stores or it can be made at home from organic waste such as vegetable peels.
In this post, we are going to cover how to make your own compost from your day-to-day household waste.
BENEFITS OF COMPOSTING AT HOME
1. Soil improvement
The most obvious benefit is that the compost you make can be used in your garden to improve the soil. It is incredibly rich in nutrients which is a bonus for plants you have growing. It will help the soil retain water and when used as a ‘mulch’ will improve water retention even further as it will stop the water from evaporating as quickly.
2. Reduced household waste
Composting will help you reduce the waste you produce as a household. Unfortunately, there are limits to what materials can be composted, so don’t expect to have zero rubbish left, but the reduction will be noticeable.
3. Saved money
If you are a gardener, you are probably buying compost every year to mulch plants that need it. Making your own compost doesn’t cost anything and you will be able to significantly reduce how much compost you have to buy thus saving you money. Depending on your garden size, you may even be able to stop buying it altogether!
4. Reduce chemical use in your garden
If you grow edibles such as vegetables, fruit and berries, the majority of guides out there recommend the use of fertilisers to improve yields. More often than not, these tend to be chemically produced products that your plant will absorb and pass on to the edible parts. Making your own nutritious compost is a great first step to shifting from chemical fertiliser use to organic gardening.
WHAT CAN BE COMPOSTED
A huge number of things can be composted but they can be grouped into a few groups:
1. Kitchen waste
Kitchen waste includes any organic material waste that doesn’t come from sentient organisms (with the exception of eggs). This means you can compost any salad, herb, vegetable, fruit and berry waste as well as leftover cooked legumes and grains. You cannot compost meat and fish. There are specialised composters that do allow this but in the traditional sense of composting, you want to stick to non-living organisms for your compost pile.
Kitchen waste also includes things such as tea leaves, compostable tea bags, coffee ground and compostable coffee filters. These days a lot of packaging (especially from organic foods) is also made from compostable materials which you can add to your compost bin.
Be wary of adding pesticide-laden waste into your compost bin if you are planning on using it on edible plants – if you buy non-organic food, the biggest pesticide carriers will be food which has inedible skin such as oranges.
2. Garden waste
Garden waste includes anything that you cut down in your garden such as grass cuttings, weeds, plant cuttings and fallen leaves. Absolutely any organic waste from your garden can go in apart from a couple of things. First, be mindful of putting in weeds that have gone to seed as you may inadvertently spread the seeds across your garden when you use the compost. Second, avoid putting in diseased plants. Any plants that you cut down that have a disease, e.g. roses suffering from black spots, should not go into your compost bin. This is because the compost will carry the disease to other plants when you eventually use it.
If you have any smallholding type animals such as chickens, goats, horses or cows you can put their poop into the compost pile. Their manure is nutritious and will only do your plants good.
You cannot compost poop from animals such as dogs and cats. There are ways of doing this but it is a different, more specialised way of composting. Equally, human waste cannot be composted in this way. You could, if you have space, build a traditional ‘outhouse’ to collect human waste which you can turn into compost but you cannot just throw it on top of the compost pile we’re talking about here.
Finally, if you have fires in your garden, you can put the ash into your compost bin.
3. Household waste
Household waste includes things such as paper and cardboard. I’m talking newspapers, envelopes, cardboard packaging, toilet and kitchen roll tubes etc. Any paper or cardboard that hasn’t got one of those shiny coatings and hasn’t got inks on it can be composted.
If you have a workshop you may have sawdust or wood chips lying around. Those can also go in but be mindful of where they came from – don’t put in anything that came from wood that has been chemically treated.
HOW TO ACTUALLY COMPOST
Nitrogen and carbon
All compostable organic materials contain carbon and nitrogen, both of which are essential for healthy compost. The ratio of carbon to nitrogen varies greatly with some plans containing much more nitrogen than other plants. In general, materials that contain the highest percentage of carbon to nitrogen should outnumber nitrogen-rich materials by about 2-1. Materials that are nitrogen-rich include green things and manure – in general, if it’s green and moist it’s nitrogen-rich. By green things I mean grass cuttings, some plants and weeds, flowers, food waste and leaves.
Other things such as sawdust, wood chippings, shrubs or tree offcuts and paper or cardboard are carbon-rich materials. In general, if it’s brown and dry then it’s carbon-rich. Keep this ratio in mind when building your compost pile, however, in my personal experience I’ve always just put whatever waste I can into the bins and the compost turned out wonderful. I think in our household we naturally produce more carbon-rich waste (especially cardboard!) so I’ve never had to strictly monitor my ratios.
The enclosed compost bin method
Enclosed compost bins can be brought from gardening shops or you can make your own. The essential features of an enclosed compost bin are a lid which helps keep excess rain out but keeps required moisture and heat in and an openable area at the bottom which allows you to take the compost out when it’s ready for use.
The enclosed bin should not have a bottom – it should be placed directly on the soil so that worms and microorganisms can easily reach the materials you are composting.
With the compost bin, you can start by adding nitrogen-rich materials to the bottom – such as grass cuttings. Then you can add anything that is compostable keeping in mind the carbon vs nitrogen ratios above. An essential component of composting is oxygen. If you want to make compost fast, you have to turn the compost. This means using a garden fork or shovel to stir the pile inside the composter every few days. This is hard work and isn’t for everyone. The alternative is not to stir which does greatly decrease the amount of oxygen available and therefore increases the amount of time the compost will take to be complete. If you don’t mind waiting, this is the easier option. Personally, this is what I do.
The compost tumbler method
The compost tumbler is a compost bin that sort of dangles off the ground and is attached from both sides. It can be spun. This makes for a much easier way to turn your compost and if you tumble it regularly, it will be ready much faster than if you were using the enclosed bin method. The cost of these types of composters isn’t much more than a standard compost bin, although from personal experience there aren’t as many of them available second hand.
Compost pile
The compost pile method is great if you have a bit more space as it involves just that – a pile of compostable materials left out in the open. In a typical small British garden, this may be a bit unsightly and a bit of interference with your garden use. However, if your garden is big enough to inconspicuously tuck away a pile of decomposing material then this option is great.
All you have to do is put your compostable materials into a pile and keep adding to it. Give it a stir once in a while and once your pile is big enough, start a second pile while the first one finishes composting. Be wary of unwanted wildlife taking advantage of your compost pile – in the UK mice, rats, rabbits and hedgehogs are sure to be attracted to the kitchen waste in your pile. You may even get something a bit bigger. Outside of the UK, you guys will know much better what you’re dealing with but I think creatures as big as bears are an issue in some places.
WHICH METHOD OF COMPOSTING IS RIGHT FOR YOU
If you are set on giving it a go making your own compost, and I would encourage you to do so, then you need to decide how to go about it. The choice should really be made based on the space you have available in your garden and how much waste you actually produce. Whether to stir or not to stir is pretty irrelevant as no matter the composter you don’t have to stir if you don’t want to.
If your garden is quite small, you definitely want to stay away from the open compost pile. If you want to make compost quickly as you have a lot of waste and want to turn it around quick time, get a tumbler. If you don’t have much waste or aren’t in a rush to get the finished product, get an enclosed bin.
A tip for either one of those is to check out second-hand websites such as eBay, Gumtree or Shpock to get one on the cheap. Or alternatively, get some scrap wood and make your own. There is absolutely no need to spend a small fortune on something that essentially acts as a box for rotting food. Another useful tip is that you can get a small windowsill box or bin for your kitchen to gather the food scraps and empty it out into the composter once it fills up. This is what I do as I’m too lazy to take out the waste daily – I let it build up for a week and empty it every weekend. Easy peasy.
