Extension Master GardenerSM Volunteers of Buncombe County

compost

Outdoor Composting: Make Black Gold for Your Garden

It’s that time of year when leaves are falling! We gardeners have choices: let the leaves remain where they’ve dropped; use them elsewhere in our landscapes; rake, bag and drag them to the curb to be added to the landfill; burn; or compost them.

Although the City of Asheville collects bagged leaves, in much of Buncombe County you must bring bags to the landfill and pay a fee. Our landfills are becoming increasingly full, made up of 20% to 30% food scraps and garden waste, according to the EPA. Burning is not permitted in the city. The county allows burning of yard waste only at designated days and times, and where there is no public trash pickup. Depending on your location, you may need a permit!

Pile of Leaves_Compost_Jeremy Noble_CC BY 2.0_Flickr
Leaves ready for compost heap

If you aren’t using leaves elsewhere in your yard, start a compost heap and make “black gold” for your garden!

Advantages of composting
Compost is the material that results from the decomposition of biodegradable materials. Composting is easy, doesn’t add to the landfill, enriches the soil while helping retain moisture, and reduces the need for chemical fertilizers. 

It’s all about the soil. Composting replenishes soil nutrients that help plants grow, slowly releasing major nutrients (nitrogen, phosphorous, potassium) for gradual use by plants. It loosens clay soil and helps sandy soil retain moisture. Use compost as a mulch at the base of plants, or dig it into the soil when planting. Compost is an ideal soil amendment for gardening uses.

Composting “do’s”
It can take from 3 months to a year to produce good workable compost, depending on the method used and how often it is turned. A composting area is ideally located in a semi-shady, level place which will be convenient to use, but is over 6 feet away from your house.

A compost pile is made of roughly equal proportions of “green” and “brown” materials with enough water to keep things damp and ready to decompose. Greens are nitrogen-rich ingredients such as vegetable and fruit scraps, coffee grounds, egg shells, and grass clippings. Browns are carbon-based materials, such as dead leaves, branches, and twigs. You can include newspaper, but make sure it does not exceed more than 10 percent of the total weight of the material in the compost heap.

Layer greens and browns in roughly equal proportions, moistening the pile as you go. The materials will compost more quickly if they are chopped into small pieces. Turning the layers periodically will speed the breakdown process.

Composting “don’ts”
Some materials just won’t work in an outside compost pile:

  • Animal products such as meat or bones, grease, or dairy products. These can attract rodents.
  • Dog feces or similar waste that may contain parasites.
  • Diseased plants or plant material that have been treated with pesticides or herbicides.
  • Glossy magazines often have toxic pigments and should not be used.
  • Orange peels and other citrus rinds, corn cobs, and nut shells which break down very slowly.
  • Any plants that contain intact seed heads.

Composting structures
If you don’t want a simple compost heap, you can use a variety of compost structures. One is a circular ring of closely woven metal fencing material about 4 to 5 feet in diameter with chain clips for fasteners. These can be unsnapped for ease in turning the pile.

A very user-friendly method is the three-bin structure, which uses a kind of assembly-line process. Place three bins next to each other in a row. Make each 3- to 5-foot square bin of sturdy fence wire, held in place with either metal or rot-resistant wood posts. Using removable slats in the front of each bin keeps the area tidy, while allowing easy access to turn the compost. Start the fresh material to be composted in the first bin. Turn it into the middle bin after a few days of “cooking,” and put a fresh batch in the first bin. Finally, move the middle material to the third bin until it is finished compost and ready to use.

Plastic drums which rotate are also available. While they make turning the compost easy, the drums can get heavy and hard to turn when full.

The finished product
Your compost is ready when it is dark brown, has a light and crumbly texture similar to potting soil, and has a pleasant earthy scent. It takes just a little effort to do so much good for your soil and for our environment!

Learn more
Extension Master Gardener Handbook: Composting
https://content.ces.ncsu.edu/extension-gardener-handbook/2-composting

Western North Carolina Regional Air Quality Agency: Open Burning Rules
https://www.buncombecounty.org/common/WncAir/burning/burning-pamphlet.pdf

Article written by Sally Wheeler, Extension Master GardenerSM Volunteer.

“Composting” Indoors? You Don’t Need Worms Anymore!

Do you have limited garden space, bear problems, or other reasons that make outdoor composting problematic? If you want to avoid throwing away food scraps, indoor “composting” is not limited to worm bins (vermicomposting) or expensive electric composting appliances.

Bokashi bucket with comfrey_Fluffymuppet_CC BY-NC-ND 2.0_Flickr
Bokashi indoor composting bucket

Enter Bokashi
Bokashi is based on Asian gardening practices and differs from traditional composting in many ways, in that it:

  • Is an anaerobic (“in the absence of air”) process that you can complete indoors.
  • Requires a closed container.
  • Requires the addition of microbes.
  • Requires minimal attention (draining of accumulated liquid).
  • Takes only about two weeks to complete once the container is filled.
  • Results in a fermented product that you bury in the garden rather than a finished compost.

Although the process has a long history, Japanese horticulture professor Teruo Higa developed several microbial products marketed as “Effective Microorganisms” (EM) that have made Bokashi more widely known and more readily available in North America.

How it works
If you purchase a container and microbe-treated bran, you need only start adding your kitchen waste—including meat and dairy products—to the container in batches, sprinkling with bran, and compressing the material each time you make an addition, then seal the container. Purchased containers include a spigot for draining off leachate every few days. You may see a white mold forming in the container when you add scraps, but this is normal. You just continue adding more scraps, sprinkling on your microbe-containing bran, and compressing the material.

Bokashi Composter_George Morris_CC BY-NC-ND 2.0_Flickr
Draining off leachate from Bokashi indoor composter

You may want more than one container if you want to continuously dispose of scraps, although you can freeze accumulating kitchen waste while your full container completes fermenting.

You can construct your own container and prepare your own bran products to save money, but this will require more effort and time. Although the process is beyond the scope of this blog, Bokashi Composting: Scraps to Soil in Weeks by Adam Footer, published by New Society Publishers in 2013, provides information on producing your own bran.

Once the sealed container is full, you need to leave it for no more than 2 weeks to finish fermenting. You will then have a product that looks much like what you put into the container—but with a sour pickled smell. This product will break down very quickly in the garden, but needs to be buried under several inches of soil to avoid attracting animals.

Pros
If you want a relatively compact, low-maintenance way to dispose of kitchen scraps, Bokashi is the way to go!

  • Disposing of dairy and meat scraps for use in the garden is a real advantage.
  • The bucket is odor-free except when you are making additions, and the smell of fermentation when you open the container or drain off leached liquids is not overpowering or unpleasant.
  • You can leave the container unattended for short vacations.
  • You can store completed materials until burial outdoors.

. . . and Cons

  • The up-front expense of containers and treated bran may be prohibitive, although certainly competitive with indoor composting set-ups (vermicomposting or electric appliances).
  • You need new or “fallow” space in your garden for burying the fermented waste.
  • You must dig a hole to use the finished product.
  • You will need to wash out the container for re-use.
Food for Good HK_IMG_2545_CC BY-NC 2.0_Flickr
Bury composted kitchen waste in the garden and improve the soil.

The verdict?
Research is ongoing about the value of Bokashi products in the garden. The leachate is sometimes touted as fertilizer. It is likely to contain phosphorus and potassium, but not nitrogen! You can simply discard this if you don’t want to try it on your plants. Research on the use of EM to produce compost suggests that in addition to speeding up the process, it can increase nutrients.

If conventional composting is not an option and you have space to bury your completed Bokashi fermentation, consider this method as an alternative to throwing away your kitchen scraps or waiting on buried scraps to decompose.

Article written by Debbie Green, Extension Master GardenerSM Volunteer.

Making Great Soil: Compost, Worms and More!

When gardeners meet, they greet each other with an endless flow of questions: “How are the tomatoes over your way?” or “Are your roses doing okay in this drought?” But you never hear “How is your soil doing?”Soil

Soil tests identify mineral content
Fortunately, one way to find out how your soil is doing is to do a soil test. Most gardeners think they need to add fertilizers to their soil to feed their plants. Experienced gardeners know that a soil test will help them pinpoint which specific nutrients—if any—their plants need, and in what proportions. The North Carolina Department of Agriculture & Consumer Services provides free soil test boxes, instructions, and soil analyses for North Carolinians between April and November. There is a $4 charge per sample for those received December through March. Pick up boxes and instructions at the Buncombe County Extension office and then ship your samples to the lab in Raleigh.

Soil as a living organism
But soil tests only give you information about the mineral elements essential for plant growth. Mineral elements are a small part of what soil scientists, biologists, and plant specialists call the “Soil Food Web.” This web is an intricate interrelationship of earthworms, insects, arthropods, and microorganisms, such as beneficial nematodes, protozoa, fungi, and bacteria. Their job in the soil is to make mineral nutrients available to the plants, preserve soil moisture, improve soil texture by opening spaces for air, and continually replenish the soil through the decomposition and recycling of organic materials.

Be a composter!
The $64,000 question? How do we increase the organic content of our soils? One of the most common answers is through composting. Composting involves recycling of organic materials— grass clippings, leaves, small twigs, weeds, garden refuse, and vegetative food scraps—from your yard, garden, and kitchen. 

“Chop and drop”
In addition to creating a separate compost pile with such materials, you can use an in-place composting technique called “chop and drop.” Simply cut weeds, leaves, vegetable scraps from the kitchen, and so forth into small pieces. You can do this by running your lawn mower over them or chopping up things with a knife or shears as you gather them. Pull back the mulch in your planting bed, put down the chopped up stuff—cover with a sheet or two of newspaper if you want to help conceal the contents—water, and then put the mulch back over the drop spot.

Be a worm whisperer!
It’s possible to do double duty to improve your soil: recycle organic matter and become a worm whisperer! Two types of worms help improve our garden soil: Nightcrawlers  (Lumbricus terrestris), which dig deep vertical channels, aerating the soil and allowing for water penetration, and red wigglers (Eisenia foetida), which dig more horizontally, speeding the decomposition of the organic matter they eat. Both pass worm castings that are rich in nutrients for the plants and for the tiny microbes working within the soil. You can purchase red wigglers if you want to set up a worm-composting bin (also known as vermiculture).

Further reading
Useful Extension publications include “Soils and Plant Nutrients” https://content.ces.ncsu.edu/extension-gardener-handbook/1-soils-and-plant-nutrients
“Soil Facts: Modifying Soil for Plant Growth around Your Home”
https://content.ces.ncsu.edu/modifying-soil-for-plant-growth-around-your-home
“A Gardener’s Guide to Soil Testing,” which you can find online at http://content.ces.ncsu.edu/a-gardeners-guide-to-soil-testing
“Vermicomposting for Households”
https://www.ces.ncsu.edu/vermicomposting-north-carolina/vermicomposting-for-households/
A comprehensive book on the subject is Keith Reid’s Improving Your Soil, 2014 Firefly Books.
For fun, read Amy Stewart’s “funny and profound” The Earth Moved: On the Remarkable Achievements of Earth Worms, 2004, Algonquin Books.

Article written by Mary Hugenschmidt, Extension Master Gardener Volunteer.

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Buncombe County Extension Office
49 Mount Carmel Road
Asheville, NC 28806
Helpline 828-255-5522

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