Compost - It's magic!

I did say composting was addictive!  I love putting most of our organic waste in the compost bin. This week I have been sieving the contents of one bin and today transferred contents from another bin to aerate and turn it.  The compost I have been sieving is now a lovely friable brown material full of earth worms and goodness - this I have used for potting on plants, it will be used as a mulch and a soil improver - thus saving money on compost and it is peat free too!

I compost pretty much everything, so if you want a list here goes

• All vegetable waste, peelings and such like - chop up large bits, we even dry our avocado stones and then crush them before they go in.
• Eggshells
• Tea bags, tea leaves and coffee grounds
• Shredded Paper/newspaper and small bits of plain cardboard
• The contents of the dyson!  Yes really - it is full of organic matter
• The cat hair after grooming - please don't say yuk - Rosie will be upset!
• Garden waste - now I have a shredder even more waste goes in - you want small shreddings - apart from diseased material which should either be burnt or can go into the council brown bin, but any cut down material goes in.
• Grass clippings - again spread these out - one large load will just smother the process
• Cooked food - this does go in - very rarely do we have food waste - we avoid putting meat into the composter and bones  - but again this is rarely an issue due to our diets. Often people say avoid this due to vermin - well Rosie is our mouser, and we have sealed bins.

You read a lot about composting and getting the balance right - I don't worry too much I just go with the flow - what you don't want is a sloppy sticky mess, nor do you want a dried up old heap - somewhere in between with a mix of what is termed the greens (veg fruit etc) and browns (woody stuff, and such like!) should work

I also put comfrey into the bin, I chop up the leaves roughly and mix through, it is a great activator and full of nutrients. You can do this with nettles too - as well as making great liquid feeds with both

So I sieve to get out any non compostable waste - plastic does find its way in, labels from plants and fruit - e.g. banana labels and the outer casings of tea bags, which is a lot as those who know me know I love my tea!!  Sometimes egg shell takes ages to break down  - it really needs to be crushed. 

Weed seeds are a problem - high temperatures do kill them, but I'd rather a few weeds come up now and then than not have this!  Perennial weeds are another issue, roots of dandelions and such like I don't put in our home compost but I do put these in the councils brown bin, which is collected free of charge fortnightly April to October!  We have privet hedging around the garden and large prunings of this also go in the councils bin as the evergreen leaves take ages to compost.

So here are some pics, just to show you what I have been up to!  Lovely weather for it too!

You can see some veg waste ready to go into a bin - it still amazes me this and all the other stuff turn into compost!  :)