Compost

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food scraps

Compost

Composting is a great way to recycle vegie scraps, fallen leaves, lawn clippings and other green garden waste back into your garden.

Homemade compost is a beaut money-saver a good compost from any source should be dark coloured, smell sweet and have a crumbly texture. It looks a lot like really good, rich soil. 

Many people get quite concerned about all the little creepy crawlies and flying things that live in their compost heap. They’re a good thing. These creepy crawlies provide food for insect-eating birds, especially over winter, when food is scarce. It’s a good idea to keep the compost lid a little bit ajar for these insects to be able to fly out. Everything that lives in a compost heap is a good thing, they help to break down and recycle the nutrients.

To get compost to rot down and become useful, you actually need to turn it over with a fork or shovel (a job not many enjoy). The more often you dig or turn your compost over, the quicker it will rot down. Many people choose to build their own compost heap or buy compost bins, which are all good but in many ways the compost tumblers are best.

Every day or two you just rotate it and you’ll get really good compost that you can use in as little as three to six weeks. If you’re wondering why the compost tumblers are so good, it’s air. If you want your compost to break down, you’ve got to get air into it all the time.

Don’s premium compost mix comprises of layers about 10cm thick of wet and dry materials: dry leaves followed by kitchen scraps followed by lawn clippings followed by small woody prunings, he also likes to add some pelleted poultry manure to give the mix a little bit of nitrogen and add a few handfuls of garden soil as a probiotic as you go. With some turning or tumbling it’ll be ready to go in no time.

One trap with the compost tumbler, the opening isn’t quite high enough off the ground to fit a wheel-barrow under to collect all that beautiful organic matter. Don made his own compost tumbler; to see how to do it CLICK HERE

Some people choose to build their own compost heap as seen in Backyard Farming. The one shown was made from welded galvanized mesh and has a door on it for easy access. This mesh can sometimes be quite sharp around the top edges and Don suggests cutting a length of old hose and placing it around the top of the unit to prevent scratches and damage to bags of waste and the mower catcher etc.

 

To get a copy of the Backyard Farming – Back to the Kitchen DVD click HERE