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Organic Compost - The Easy Way

By: Tom Johnson The very best thing you can do for your garden is to use organic compost. It's one of the safest ways to grow your plants. Not only that, but your entire garden will flourish from the liberal use of this fantastic organic material.

At the core of good compost is lots of carbon. This can be found in the brown waste from your yard such as straw, dead leaves, dried flowers and shredded newspaper. It's important not to forget these essential materials as some folks do, they're the beginning of your heap.

The next layer should be green waste that's full of nitrogen. All your lawn clippings, kitchen waste and green garden prunings should be thrown onto your heap. When we talk of kitchen waste we mean any vegetable peelings, fruit peel or green leftovers, but never any meat!

Your next step is to toss some plain old dirt from your garden on the pile. This will get your compost to start the process of breaking down.

So, to recap, you start with a layer of brown material, then you add some green stuff and then a layer of garden soil. On top of this you add another layer of brown waste. Lastly you need to damp down your compost by adding some water. Just make it moist, don't swamp it!

You continue adding layers in that order until you've got a pile about 3 feet square. As a rough guide you want to have about three parts brown waste to one part green waste. Keep adding more material to your pile as it becomes available until it's about 3 feet tall.

You will need to turn your compost with a garden fork to aid the decomposition. As you turn, you want to move the stuff from the center to the outside and the outer material to the middle. You should do this every couple of weeks at least.

To understand why the moisture level is so important, if your pile dries out it will stop decomposing. The easiest way to know if your compost is healthy is to watch for steam to rise as you're turning your pile. This is a clear indication that your heap is decomposing correctly.

The worms in your garden will find your compost in a short time and aid in the process, but if you feel impatient and want to speed up the decomposition, you can always buy some common earthworms to put in your pile. The best place to find them is at your nearest fishing bait store.

There are many good reasons for keeping a tidy garden, so you should think about building or buying a bin for your compost. You can now purchase bins that you rotate by turning a handle, this can speed up the process of turning over your compost.

As your compost decays it will turn into a nearly black substance that will have a sweet smell. At this stage it's ready to be mixed into your garden soil to enrich it with all the nutrients needed to grow fantastic crops. It's also excellent for use as potting soil, you don't need to add anything else to it. Over time you will replace all your garden soil with this enriched organic compound and your plants will thrive.