How to make compost
Garden Organic’s Video Guide Part 2 includes:
- When is the compost ready
- Using your compost

How to make compost
Garden Organic’s Video Guide Part 2 includes:
- When is the compost ready
- Using your compost

Using compost in your garden can make your flowers and plants thrive! Get tips on planting with compost and mixing compost with soil in your garden in this free organic composting video.

Expert: G…

Little Known Gardener From The High Nevada Desert Reluctantly Reveals His Top Organic Gardening Secrets That Bring Him Record Returns Year After Year!

Composting For Profit.

Compost needs a certain amount of water to break down correctly, but too much water can keep the compost from getting enough air. Learn how to make sure your compost pile has the right amount of wa…

Air is an important ingredient in compost. Learn how, and how often, to aerate (turn over) your compost in this free organic gardening video.

Expert: Gale Gassiot
Bio: Gale Gassiot makes her own o…

Want to start an organic compost pile quickly? An expert shares a home-made recipe that you can use to make your compost pile quickly break down in this free organic gardening video.

Expert: Gale …

How to make compost
Garden Organic’s Video Guide Part 2 includes:
- When is the compost ready
- Using your compost

How do you know when your organic compost in your compost bin is ready to be used as fertilizer for plants in your garden? Find out in this free organic gardening video.

Expert: Gale Gassiot
Bio: …

Even a composting neophyte can create top-notch compost with the right recipe. Akin to cooking, composting is half art, and half science. Awareness of these basic factors will help you getting started. Just like a chef demands high quality ingredients, successful composting needs the best ingredients too. Good materials for composting include these: grass clippings, leaves, plant stalks, hedge trimmings, old potting soil, twigs, vegetable scraps, coffee filters, and tea bags.
Bad composting materials include: diseased plants, weeds with seed heads, invasive weeds, pet feces, dead animals, bread and grains, meat or fish parts, dairy products, grease, cooking oil, or oily foods.

To prepare compost, you need organic materials, microorganisms, air, water, and a small quantity of nitrogen. Organic material is what you are trying to decompose (see above for Dos and Donts). Microorganisms are tiny forms of plant and animal life, which break down organic material. A small amount of garden soil or manure supplies adequate microorganisms. The air, nitrogen, and water offer an encouraging environment for the microorganisms to produce your compost. You can add enough nitrogen to the compost with small amount of nitrogen fertilizer., which can be purchased at hardware stores or nurseries. Air is the one ingredient which you cant have too much of. Too much nitrogen can kill microbes; too much water causes insufficient air in the pile.

If microorganisms have more surface area to feed off of, the materials will decompose faster. Chopping your organic materials with a machete, or using a shredder or lawnmower to shred materials will help them break down faster.

The compost pile is your oven. Compost piles catch heat created by the activity of millions of microorganisms. The minimum size for hot, fast composting is a 3-foot by 3-foot by 3-foot. But piles wider or taller than 5 feet don’t permit enough air to reach the microorganisms at the center.

Your compost piles microorganisms work their hardest when the materials have about the moistness of a wrung-out sponge and as many air passages. The air in the pile is usually consumed faster than the moisture, so the pile should be turned or mixed up now and then to add more air; this maintains high temperatures and controls odor. Use a pitchfork, rake, or other garden tool can to turn materials with.

Maybe youve never heard the term vermiculture, if so dont feel bad, many experienced gardeners are unfamiliar with this organic practice. I think vermiculture is fascinating; simply put its the process of composting kitchen waste with earthworms. Were not talking about common night crawlers, but special varieties of worms such as red worms, and red wigglers.

Okay, Ill admit to owning an ant farm when I was a kid, but this is so much more practical. Vermiculture, or vermicomposting as its also known is more like beekeeping; yes Ive given that a try too. But just imagine for a second, you feed the worms your leftover garbage and kitchen scraps. The worms then quickly eat all those leftovers, sparing you the hassles of taking out the garbage.

And heres the best part, while the composting worms are disposing of your garbage, theyre also producing a terrific organic fertilizer and soil conditioner called earthworm castings. Well, okay the term earthworm casting is just a nice name for earthworm excrement. I dont know who thought up the name earthworm castings, but I guess it makes sense if you think it through.

You may have seen worm castings for sale at your local garden center and didnt realize what you were dealing with, but now you know. Dont worry, earthworm castings are clean, odorless, and sterile trust me on this one. You dont need gloves or a shovel to handle them, and they are wonderful for improving your soil quality and for promoting the growth and health of all your plants.

So you can purchase bags of earthworm castings to use around the garden or if youre a little more adventurous you can set up an earthworm farm and produce your own. The farm is actually just a worm bin that can be set up indoors or outdoors depending on the climate.

Vermicomposting isnt complicated, but the worms are living creatures, and have certain requirements. For example they dont tolerate extremely hot living conditions, and they also wont survive freezing. The worms are pretty healthy eaters, so while eggshells are fine, dont try slipping any meat, fats, or greasy foods into their diet.

If this sounds a little like having a pet, well it is. Not terribly demanding, but they do require a little of your attention to make sure that things run smoothly. In exchange theyll be hard at work performing their community service to save the environment and to help you grow a better garden.

Kids love vermicomposting and some schools even include vermiculture as part of the curriculum. For those of you wishing that they had grown up with a worm bin instead of that ant farm, its not too late to try one out. You can find plans for building homemade bins or you can purchase fancy multi-level bins over the Internet. And unlike those ant farms, you can have these bins delivered complete with the composting worms.

If youre up for the challenge and interested in recycling your familys kitchen waste into a valuable fertilizer and soil conditioner, try your hand at vermiculture. During long winters, it may even help to pass the time until you can get back out into the garden.

Compost, made from decomposed grass clippings, leaves, twigs, and branches, becomes a dark, crumbly mixture of organic matter.

Learn how composting works. Even a newbie to composting can make good quality compost. It can be compared to cooking as art or part science. The following 7 factors will help you master the art of composting.

1. Materials
After a time anything that was once alive will naturally decompose. But, not all organic items should be composted for the home. To prepare compost, organic material, microorganisms, air, water, and a small amount of nitrogen are needed.

These items are safe to compost at home:
* grass clippings
* trimmings from hedges
* vegetable scraps
* leaves
* potting soil that has grown old
* twigs
* coffee filters with coffee grounds
* tea bags
* weeds that have not went to seed
* plant stalks

These items are Not safe to compost at home:
* weeds that have went to seed
* dead animals
* pet feces
* bread and grains
* meat
* grease
* cooking oil
* oily foods
*diseased plants

2. What To Do To Make It Work
There are small forms of plant and animal life which break down the organic material. This life is called microorganisms. From a minute amount of garden soil or manure comes plenty of microorganisms.

Nitrogen, air, and water will provide a favorable environment for the microorganisms to make the compost. Air circulation and water will keep the microorganisms healthy and working. The nitrogen feeds the tiny organisms. You may have to add a small amount of nitrogen to the pile.

Putting on too much nitrogen can kill microbes and too much water causes insufficient air in the pile. You just cannot add too much air.

3. Beneficial Microorganisms
Bacteria are the most effective compost makers in your compost pile. They are the first to break down plant tissue. Then comes the fungi and protozoans to help with the process. The arthropodes, like centipedes, beetles, millipedes and worms, bring in the finishing touches to complete the composting.

4. Smaller is Better
The materials will break down faster if the microorganisms have more surface area to eat. Chopping your garden materials with a chipper, shredder, or lawnmower will help them decompose faster.

5. Size of The Pile
The activity of millions of microorganisms generates heat in the compost pile but a minimum size 3-foot by 3-foot by 3-foot is needed for a hot, fast composting pile. Piles that are any larger may hamper the air supply needed in the pile for the microorganisms.

6. Moisture and Aeration
If you can imagine a wet squeezed out sponge with its many air pockets, then this would be the ideal enviroment for the microorganisms in the pile to function at their best. Pay attention while your pile is composting, to the amount of rain or a drought you may have. Water in a drought and maybe turn the pile in a lot of rainy days. The extremes of these two may upset the balance of the pile. The use of a pitchfork would come in handy at this time.

7. Temperature and Time
Keep your pile between 110F and 160F and the beneficial bacteria will love it. Not too cool nor too hot.
The temperature will rise over several days if you keep a good ratio of carbon and nitrogen, maintain lots of surface area within a large volume of material, and maintain adequate moisture and aeration.

-Importance of Compost-

+Compost has nutrients, but it is not a complete fertilizer.

+Compost provides nutrients in the soil until plants need to use them.

+ It loosens and aerates clay soils

+ Retains water in sandy soils.

-Using the Compost-

+ A soil amendment, mix 2 to 5 inches of compost into gardens each year before planting.

+ A potting mixture, add one part compost to two parts potting soil.

+ Make your own potting mixture by using equal parts of compost and sand or perlite.

+ A mulch, prodcast 2 to 4 inches of compost around annual flowers and vegetables, and up to 5 inches around your trees and shrubs.

+ A top dressing, mix finely sifted compost with sand and sprinkle evenly over lawns.

The final thing I would suggest once you have mastered the art of composting is to look very seriously at making your very own aerated compost tea. This elixir will give you results that are hard to believe.

This how-to video by the nonprofit group Kitchen Gardeners International shows you step-by-step instructions for successful organic composting. … compost composting sustainability food organic garden

What features should you look for when buying or making a compost bin? Find out and get tips on how compost bin design can help to aerate compost for your garden, in this free organic gardening video. Expert: Gale Gassiot Bio: Gale Gassiot makes her own organic compost or “gardener’s black gold.”