Gardening Pleasures

Archive for the ‘Composting’ Category

Some of us may be hesitant making and using compost. We may find the task troublesome and time consuming. Or we might have the idea that a compost pile smells and don’t like the idea of having such a messy process going in our backgardens. Although some people will still prefer to buy their fertilizers, soil conditioners, and mulch from a garden centre, they can actaully save a considerable amount of money by learning how, and actually making, a compost pile of their own. And, by the way, when done correctly, they do not smell and are not messy.

Here are some of my reasons for making and utlising composting. So, once you’ve read all of them, please think about, and then actually start, making your own compost.

The first reason I find composting worthwhile is the fact that the raw materials needed are free and readily available. Compare that with the ever rising costs of commercial fertilizers and other gardening products. All you really need to do is find some materials with which to build a containment structure for your compost pile, after that everything that goes into it is free.

The second one is that compost provides the same nutrients and minerals needed by my plants as commercial organic or synthetic fertilizers. The overall effect of good compost lasts longer than commercial fertilizers. Plus, depending on what ingredients you put into it, you can get quite a large range of nutrients back out for your plants. It’s free and it works just as well, if not better - who can argue with that?

Another good reason is the benefits of using compost for the soil structure. When applied to the soil, compost can help reduce erosion, improve water retention, and in heavy soil like clay, compost will lighten the soil and reduce soil compaction. Using your own compost can also make the soil easier to till.

The right composting process can kill troublesome weeds as well as pests and disease-causing organisms present in the vegetable matter being composted.  Although the technique I’m talking about here is high temperature composting and this is a technique regularly used on an industrial scale rather than what we normally do on the backgarden level, I think this actually adds to the reasons for making our own compost.

There have been studies that indicate the use of compost can suppress the incidence of diseases in crops. Other studies have shown that crops grown in compost-rich soil are more resistent to pest/insect attacks. Likewise, some field trials have shown crops grown using compost produce fruits and vegetables that store better.  Those are pretty good reasons for me.

For the environmentalists and conservationists in the group, compost has a lot going for them. Using compost with soil can actually build soil carbon which will eventually reduce the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. While, to have a truely positive effect on current greenhouse gases, it will require quite a lot of people using composting regularly,  it’s useful to know we all can still have a global impact.

Using compost also helps soil that has become toxic with agricultural chemicals. It’s been found that the use of compost can result in soil acidity levels coming back into balance and for farmers wanting to go organic after years of using synthetic agricultural chemicals, it can shorten the time necessary to acquire true organic status.

The widespread use of recycling our vegetable/kitchen waste through the use of a compost heap would mean that without all of the biological waste going into landfills, they would no longer fill up as quickly, and as a society we could use fewer chemcials thereby making the whole environment safer for all living creatures.  These are only two very good reasons for regularly using composting for dealing with garden and kitchen waste.