Organic Book of Compost. Pauline Pears
your garden, whatever its style and size.
Homemade compost is all that these cabbages need to produce a good crop. The benefits to garden flowers are evident too.
How compost benefits the garden
• Makes your garden grow!
• Makes heavy clay soil lighter, so it drains better and is easier for plant roots to penetrate.
• Adds “body” to light soil so that it holds on to water and plant foods, thus reducing the need for feeding and watering.
• Feeds the millions of soil-living creatures that keep the soil healthy.
• Helps plants to resist pest and disease attack.
This crop of sweetcorn and beans has benefited from homemade compost. Herbs and flowers (above) will also show the results of compost use.
NO MORE BONFIRES!
Although bonfires are banned in many areas now, they can still be a common sight (and smell) in some places. This is a waste of resources and is unnecessary, particularly as nearly all weeds and crop wastes can be composted and broken down, returning their nutrients to the soil.
BENEFITS FOR THE FUTURE ENVIRONMENT
We are told that we must make lifestyle changes to reduce the impact of climate change and minimize our personal carbon footprint. How can home composting kitchen scraps and garden rubbish make a difference?
SAVING PEAT BOGS
Homemade compost, leaf mold and mulches can be used in the garden in place of peat and peat-based seed and potting composts used by amateur gardeners.
So why is using peat a problem?
Peat is the result of thousands of years of plants slowly decomposing in waterlogged, acidic conditions. We have been using this resource so quickly in recent times that there is no opportunity for it to replenish itself.
Like the tropical rainforests that so many people have fought to preserve, peat bogs provide the habitat for a huge diversity of plant and animal life, from mosses to birds. These areas should be preserved before they are destroyed forever. Peat extraction not only disturbs rare wildlife but also releases carbon dioxide (one of the main “greenhouse gases” responsible for global warming) into the atmosphere every year. Bogs contain millions of tons of carbon.
WILDLIFE HABITAT
The compost bin itself provides an extra habitat for wildlife in your garden. As well as the millions of microscopic and tiny creatures that do the composting, others, such as worms, lizards and snakes (increasing rarities) may find a compost bin an attractive place to live for a while.
REDUCE GREENHOUSE GASSES
When kitchen scraps and garden prunings (biodegradable waste) are buried in a landfill site they decay without oxygen, unlike composting which is an aerobic (with oxygen) process. This means that methane is produced, another gas that is a major contributor to the greenhouse effect, which causes global warming.
Landfill operators now have measures to capture methane, using it, for example, to power generators on site and also add energy back into the national grid. However, this equipment is costly to install and maintain, and there is still some loss of gas.
SUSTAINABLE AND LOCAL MEANS ENERGY EFFICIENT
Home composting is remarkably energy efficient in several respects. These days an increasing volume of the biodegradable waste collected by local authorities, and that delivered to recycling centers, will be composted. This is much better than putting it into landfill, but it still has an environmental impact in the amount of energy used to transport and process the waste. In some cases you can buy the resulting compost (which is better than using peat) but this is often packaged in plastic sacks and also needs to be transported, thus consuming valuable energy resources.
The only energy required for home composting is yours! Using home compost and other home-recycled products on the garden in place of purchased products will also save the energy required for their production, packaging and distribution. Fertilizers can be very energy-intensive to produce; some are based on dwindling natural resources and may be imported from distant countries.
CUT LANDFILL
Over the last few decades we have been filling up landfill sites (basically holes in the ground) with rubbish. This is not a sustainable option. Landfill sites can pollute the environment and suitable sites are becoming increasingly scarce.
One of the current alternatives to landfill is “Energy from Waste,” which includes incineration. This is not a popular alternative with the general public because of the perceived issue of local environmental impact.
Both landfill and incineration are huge wastes of natural resources. The more that householders can reduce the volume of waste they throw away, the less will be the need for either landfill sites or for controversial incinerators.
CONCLUSIONS
Individuals make compost for all sorts of different reasons – from saving time and money to being able to show their children all the amazing creatures that live in a compost bin. Pick your own reasons and give it a go!
So you’ve got lots of reasons to get composting, but where on earth do you start? This chapter looks at some of the things you need to consider to help you decide how to begin and what method to use. Where to put a container, what sorts of materials you might want to compost and which methods might be right for your circumstances are all addressed in the following pages.
WHERE TO START
There are a number of considerations to keep in mind when trying to determine which method of composting might be right for your circumstances. Where do you live and what do you want to recycle?
EQUIPMENT
Composting doesn’t need any expensive high-tech equipment; as you will learn in the next chapter, the composting organisms do most of the work for you. The only equipment needed is a container for your compost. This could be a plastic compost bin purchased locally, a sophisticated compost tumbler or just a few old pallets nailed together quite roughly and placed somewhere in your garden.
LOCATION
You will also want to think about where to place your compost container. Generally it should be somewhere accessible that receives some direct sunlight. You also want to make it a convenient distance from your kitchen to encourage you to make frequent trips with your kitchen waste and paper. Look at the section entitled “A home for your compost,” here,