We recently put together our own outdoor compost bin to collect our yard and food scraps. I read and re-read tips and tricks on how to get started and I’d like to share a few of those tips with you, whether you want to be a city, indoor, or backyard composter.

Here are a few ways to get started:

1. If your city offers yard waste or composting service, sign up immediately! All you need to do is collect your yard and food waste trimmings in the city provided bin. To keep the bin clean, you can line with Tall Kitchen Biodegradable BioBags. The city will pick up once or every other week based on their schedule and will turn your waste into compost. You may see it as compost at your local garden store the following spring. This type of composting offers the lowest maintenance.

2. Lack outdoor space, but still want to compost? It is possible! You can use a kitchen composter, a small self-contained unit, to collect food scraps only. They will churn your waste into nutrient-rich compost. Another method for indoor composting is vermicomposting, the practice of hosting a small population of worms to compost your kitchen debris. It is said that vermicomposting produces some of the most fertile compost in the world.

3. Ready for a compost bin in your backyard? Besides vermicomposting, I’d say this can be the most intimidating way to compost, but here are five simple steps to get you on your way to outdoor composting:

• Build your bin. I would highly recommend reusing leftover wood pallets to build your compost box. Not only are you re-using, but you could also save money on the project as you can typically pick up pallets for free. Pallets allow for air flow through the bin as well. You can also purchase outdoor composting bins from your local hardware or garden store.
• Layer #1. Collect “brown” matter – twigs, dried leaves, pinecones, dead plants, newspaper, eggshells – and place on the bare floor of your compost bin. This layer should be six inches deep.
• Layer #2. Collect “green” matter – leaves, grass clippings, fruit and vegetable scraps – and place on top of the first layer. This second layer should be three inches deep and topped with a bit of soil or finished compost.
• Layer #3. Add an additional three inches of “brown” matter, lightly mix the top two layers together, and moisten the compost pile with water.
• Maintenance. Turn the pile with a pitchfork every one to two weeks. Compost should be ready within one to four months.

Happy Composting! Which of three composters are you?

Tags: a greener kitchen, backyard composting, city composting, indoor composting, outdoor composting, vermicomposting

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 1st, 2011 at 9:38 pm and is filed under Go Green Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.