The Civilized Compost Bin

Feed your garden and keep your neighbors happy.

Compost is like superfuel for your garden. It’s just so rich in nutrients. It feeds your plants, and it even feeds your soil by providing food for the microorganisms that live in it. The result is healthy, robust, disease-resistant plants that don’t need artificial fertilizers.

Compost is so valuable that people pay for it. You’ve probably bought a bag or two of compost to mix into your garden soil or flower beds to give your plants a boost. Even the professional organic gardeners love the stuff so much that they’ll pay to have it brought in by the truckload.

So why make compost at home? After all, it’s extra work, and if you’re already busy with your garden, you might choose to forego what’s essentially a process of creating your own soil. And that’s fine!

But if you have the desire and the time, you can streamline the composting process by using good techniques and investing in the right supplies. There’s something very satisfying about turning organic food waste into living soil that nurtures your plants, instead of sending it to a landfill.

Managing your compost pile

Mixing a good compost pile is a bit like baking a cake. You want to control the moisture content and the heat level so the microbes that live in your kitchen scraps can do their job breaking down the raw material into the finished product. You don’t need to measure everything and worry over it. Use your intuition and keep checking the contents of your barrel to see how things are coming along.

• Moisture: Aim for 40 to 60% moisture. If the pile isn’t decomposing quickly enough and seems dry, add some water and wait a day or two. Check the progress and adjust as necessary.
• Heat: A compost pile should be hot enough to break down your scraps and discourage insect pests, but not hot enough to kill the microbes that turn your scraps into dirt. Direct sun exposure in the summer will be too much heat, while in the cooler months the sun will help keep things humming along. Again, check your barrel often until you’re happy with the results, and expect slower breakdown in the colder months.

Composting do’s and don’ts

First you should know that not everything that goes in the trash can can be composted. Here are the three big no-no’s of composting:

• No fats. That means no meat scraps or bones, no dairy products, and nothing that’s had oil added to it. If your leftover salad has dressing on it, throw it in the trash, not the compost bin.
• No grains. That means no bread crusts, no pasta, and no leftover rice or other cereals. These items break down slowly and attract rodents.
• No germs. For example, technically, kitty litter is biodegradable, but you don’t want it going into your food supply. Big commercial piles are hot enough to compost manure, but for your small garden pile, apply the “yuck factor” liberally when deciding what to add to your bin.

These restrictions are pretty easy to remember. It’s all part of knowing what goes into your food, which is one of the reasons people garden in the first place.

That leaves plenty of raw materials for your compost bin. You can compost anything green like old lettuce and carrot tops, fruit peels like bananas and oranges, and root vegetables like potatoes that are past their prime. Coffee grounds and tea leaves come from plants, so they’re fair game – in fact, coffee grounds produce such rich compost that some compost connoisseurs save them in a separate bin for their especially prized flowers or tomato plants. Eggshells are bit slow to break down, but they’re so full of minerals that most gardeners like to include them.

Should you compost your yard waste?

Homeowners with lots of yard space have the option of composting their grass clippings, fallen leaves, and even weeds if their pile is big enough and hot enough to kill the weed seeds. You’ll read lots of online advice about getting just the right mix of “green” and “brown” waste, but small space gardeners are in a different situation. Your goal is to make a small amount of good compost for your deck pots and raised beds, and for that, kitchen scraps and a small bin are sufficient.

Can paper be composted?

Yes, it can, but use caution. Big commercial composting operations welcome paper towels and cardboard, but that’s because they manage big piles that break things down fast. Your pile will be much smaller, and that means slower. You don’t want to open your compost bin and find scraps of paper after everything else has broken down into rich black dirt. If you compost your tea bags, be sure to cut off the strings and staple, and if it looks like they contain any plastic, into the trash they go.

The best compost barrel for small spaces

If you have a small garden, you probably have close neighbors. They don’t want a smelly compost pile that attracts pests, and neither do you. A properly controlled compost pile has very little odor, so you’ll want to invest in a good compost barrel that’s designed to promote a quick breakdown of the day’s table scraps and keep out insects and rodents. Bonus points if it looks good sitting on your deck.

Compost needs to be turned 1 to 3 times per week to mix it up. You definitely want a tumbler-type barrel so you can turn the contents without opening it. Don’t fill your tumbler to the top, because the microbes in compost need air to turn your scraps into the good stuff. As you get your technique dialed in, the process will become a breeze: open the trapdoor, empty your kitchen scrap bucket into the tumbler, close the door, and give the tumbler a spin. Done!

Harvesting your compost

When the contents of your compost barrel look and smell like rich, black dirt, it’s time to reap the rewards of your efforts. Get out the soil bucket you use for transplanting, or better yet, a 20 gallon storage tub. Remove the access door from the barrel and empty in the contents. Compost is very absorbent and can waterlog your plants, so mix it 50-50 with a high quality potting soil formulated for indoor plants to promote better drainage.

Watch your plant growth and health take off like Jack and his beanstalk with compost you make yourself.