Compost Organic Matter

Composting is fun and easy

Discover how easy it is to make organic matter "compost" from your yard waste. Turn your yard waste into a nutritionally rich humus for flowers, shrubs, vegetables and lawns. Stop wasting time and effort bagging leaves and grass clipping, avoid the expense of buying organic matter. Start saving expensive landfill space, that represents over 20 percent of the nation's total landfill waste.

What's compost good for ?

• Compost provides an inexpensive nutrient rich soil conditioner that will increase the growth and vigor of your plants.
• It improves soil structure and drainage, and releases nitrogen for plants and soil organisms.
• It reduces leaching of plant essential elements such as potassium, calcium and magnesium.
• It improves the soil's physical characteristic making it more workable.

Many people add organic matter "compost" into their garden prior to spring planting and as a top dressing on the soil during the growing season. Adding organic matter to lawns as a top dressing in the spring helps to improve the soil and is great for problem area's. Compost adds important nutrients to potted plants both indoor and out. Compost used as a mulch keeps needed moister in the ground on lawns and gardens.

Composting is easy

Remember that composting happens all by itself, requiring very little work. Compost is made by billions of micro-organisms (fungi, bacteria, etc.) that digest the yard and kitchen waste that you provide for them. To compost, all you need is vegetation in the "greens and browns" color range. Grass clipping are "greens" and leaves are "browns". The following are a few samples of GREENS & BROWNS.

Greens	Browns
Grass/lawn clippings	Dried Grass/lawn clippings
Fresh hay/straw	Dried hay/straw
Kitchen waste	Wood chips/sawdust
Fresh weeds	Dried weeds
Green leaves	Dried leaves
Fresh manure	Dried manure

What not to compost

Never add the following in your compost:

• Chemically-Treated Wood Products
• Diseased Plants
• Human, Dog or Cat Waste
• Meat, Bones, and Fatty Food Waste

Compost containers

There are many different type of compost container available on the market today, from simple to fancy ones, made from wood wire, or plastic, with prices from $ 25 to $175 depending on what you like or are willing to pay. If your a do-it-yourself kind of person you can go down to your local hardware store and buy the materials to build your own.

Compost Maker Starter Kit

The volunteers at AEF have put together an exceptional compost pen. One size holds up to 6.5 cu ft. of space for home use, with a lager sizes for bigger jobs that holds up to 9.5 cu. ft. AEF Compost Maker Starter Kit is easy to use and is available at the Country Store.

Layering

It's really easy to make your compost pile work. Start with a 6-8 inch pile of leaves "browns" and grass clippings "greens". Now add about 1-2 inches of soil. Keep repeating the layers to the desired amount. Keep damp with water, turn the pile from time to time to give it air and to mix up compost. Both a 50% moisture and air are necessary for the micro-organisms to breakdown matter. Check the temperature of the compost since decaying vegetable matter will generates heat. If your pile is warm you're doing it right. You can help speed up the process by keeping your compost pile covered to contain the heat.

When is my compost ready to use ?

Compost is generally considered to be complete when the color shifts to a dark color (Black Gold) and has a sweet earthy smell. There is no single point at which compost is finished, it's a bit more subjective than that for many outdoor garden applications, for instance, it can be fine to use compost that still has a few recognizable bits of leaves and material, which will finish rotting in the soil. If you plan to use compost in seed-staring mixes, it is best having a well-finished compost, because seedling roots may be attacked by decomposer microbes if the roots contact unfinished compost.

As you have discovered by reading the above, composting is very easy to do and is a great way to recycle your yard wastes. In return you receive (Black Gold) better and fresher then you would ever be able to buy at even the best nurseries. Get a compost pile started today!