Waste can mean beauty

This week’s tip is intended to aid you during your gardening and landscaping activities this Spring and Summer.

There are many philosophies and strategies for designing and maintaining healthy gardens, shrubs and other plants. Most gardeners and landscapers agree some amount of composting goes a long way towards keeping your property healthy and free of intruding or non-native plant species. Compost is plant matter that has decomposed and broken down. The most common use for compost is as a fertilizer or as a soil amendment. Organic compost is loaded with healthy nutrients and minerals plants need in order to flourish. Compost can be bought at your local home improvement, hardware or gardening store. There’s a much more effective and green way to go about composting your plants: make your own. Almost every household has the ability to produce compost. The formula is easy and you already have the ingredients. All you need to do is set aside unused, leftover, damaged or rotten vegetation, including fruits and vegetables, withering or dead household plants, old flowers and yard waste- it can all be mixed together. Some people have a container designated to compost that they keep in their kitchen next to the regular trash can. Next you will need to clear an exterior area of your property to make room for a compost pile and/or compost bins. Since the interior compost container can get filled up and smelly rather quickly you may want to make it a habit to empty it onto the pile outdoors more regularly than you would the regular waste in your trash cans. Be prepared to take at least two trips per week out to your pile. You’ll be surprised how mast that pile can grow. You will want to maintain the pile by mixing it up every few weeks. This expedites the decay process. A pitch fork makes the best tool, I’ve found. The older stuff at the bottom is the end product so when it comes time to do some composting take your yield from there. It will take months for Mother Nature to do her work but at the end you’ll have a whole mess of free, organic compost at your disposal. And you’ll feel good knowing you’ve saved time and money and reduced your carbon footprint by recycling unwanted waste. You’ll also be surprised at the volume of waste you will divert from the trash can to the compost container. You may even find you can downsize your kitchen's trash can (imagine the impact this would create if everyone composted- smaller, fewer landfills, one trash night a week compared to two; its endless).

Composting is not a warm-weather exclusive activity. You can add to your compost pile year-round. It will never stop breaking down into its finest particles, however extreme cold can temporarily suspend the process.

Making and maintaining your own organic compost is an easy green practice to implement in to your daily lives. And the quality of the compost you make yourself doesn’t even compare to the store bought stuff!

Happy fertilizing!