Why Com­post­ing?

• It insu­lates the soil and helps it to retain mois­ture longer than usual.
• It adds a com­plex web of microor­gan­isms to the soil that can be thought of as nature’s “fer­til­izer fac­to­ries.”  Most of these lit­tle bugs eat organic mat­ter in the soil and turn it into nutri­ents that plants need in order to thrive.  Whereas, chem­i­cal fer­til­izer can prove to be fatal to many of these sen­si­tive organ­isms, and overuse of non-natural prod­ucts can kill all life in the soil.
• It pro­vides a com­plete nutri­ent base that facil­i­tates the sym­bi­otic rela­tion­ship between the microor­gan­isms and the plant. Plants pro­duce sugar (car­bo­hy­drates) through pho­to­syn­the­sis and send this energy down to the roots. Roots col­lect nutri­ents like nitro­gen, cal­cium, and mag­ne­sium, and will often make a trade exchange with microorganisms—sugars for nutrients.

Com­post­ing Demon­stra­tions
Visit a com­post demon­stra­tion site for hands-on com­post­ing tech­niques for recy­cling yard­waste and “Let Worms Eat Your Garbage” ver­mi­com­post­ing. For loca­tions and times visit the Recy­cling Division’s com­post­ing page.

Build­ing a Com­post Pile is Easy!

• Select the mate­ri­als to be com­posted. In gen­eral, leaves, grass clip­pings, brush and veg­etable waste all work well.
• Shred or chop mate­ri­als to accel­er­ate composting.
• Mix lay­ers of plant mate­ri­als high in nitro­gen with those high in car­bon. As a rule of thumb, green mate­ri­als such as grass clip­pings are higher in nitro­gen and brown mate­ri­als such as leaves are higher in car­bon. By alter­nat­ing lay­ers of green and brown mate­ri­als, nitro­gen becomes more read­ily avail­able for micro­bial action.
• When nitro­gen rich plant mate­ri­als are not avail­able, spread about a cup of 10−10−10 fer­til­izer with each cubic yard of com­pressed plant material.
• Build your pile to max­i­mum of 4 feet high by 4 feet wide. Piles higher or wider may lack the nec­es­sary oxy­gen to decom­pose quickly.

Care of Your Com­post Pile
The opti­mal mois­ture con­tent of the pile should fall between 40 and 60 per­cent. The com­post should feel damp, but you should not be able to squeeze out any free mois­ture. To alle­vi­ate excess mois­ture, the pile can be cov­ered to exclude rain or turned more fre­quently to allow it to dry. The pile should be watered dur­ing dry spells.

The Finer Points of Com­post­ing
A free stand­ing pile will suf­fice or an inex­pen­sive enclo­sure can be built with wooden pal­lets. More sub­stan­tial enclo­sures may be built from wire mesh or wood and wire mesh, or attrac­tive pre­fab­ri­cated com­post bins may be pur­chased from local hard­ware stores. Do not add meat or dairy prod­ucts to your com­post piles — they cause odors and attract ani­mals. To alle­vi­ate odors caused by exces­sive nito­gen or water-logged com­post, turn the pile fre­quently. After a few dry days the odors will dis­ap­pear. If your com­post pile heats up prop­erly, most dis­ease and insect organ­isms will be destroyed. Depend­ing on the type of yard­waste placed in the pile and the num­ber of times it is turned, com­posted plant mate­r­ial should be ready to use in the gar­den dur­ing the next grow­ing season.

Pur­chase Com­post
Want com­post, but don’t have the yard space to make your own com­post pile? You’re in luck! Check the bot­tom of the com­post­ing web­page for a list of loca­tions that retail this ‘black gold’.