How To Make Your Own Compost Pile?

If you’re a gardener then you should not mind getting your hands dirty. In this line of work, you need to handle plants, soil, rocks, fertilizer, soil conditioners, etc. and not all times a pair of gardening gloves is handy.

At times using glove can prevent you handling some delicate stuff. In this case, you have to get down on your knees and get your hands dirty.

And nothing is dirtier that making compost.

What does composting mean?

Composting is a the process were biodegradable materials, usually manure and household wastes, are turned into soil-like output by combining them with a little air, water and nitrogen. Is that too technical for you?

Well compost is a dark, crumbly, soil-like substance which functions as soil conditioner, mulch, and fertilizers. It feed your garden soil the microorganism that most plants need to grow healthy and strong.

Things you need to consider when making your own compost pile:

When making your own compost pile, it would be ideal to find a place near your garden and yet it has enough concealment to not affect the overall look of your garden. Does that make sense? Just like one of the famous movies say “hiding in plain sight”.

If such is the case, a cleverly painted compost bin would help make the area neater. A corral or a fenced area would do fine to make your own compost pile.

After setting up your composting area, you start composting by arranging a 3:1 ratio of brown and green organic materials.

Green ingredients contain lots of nitrogen while the brown elements contain lots of carbon. Together, they form the basic foundations of a compost file. The green organic components of gardening include grass clipping while the brown components are the dry leaves and other wood products.

If you’re worried about the possible bad smell that would come out of your compost pile, then don’t. When the ratio of greens and browns is correct, you don’t have to worry of any bad smell from your compost pile.

Compost pile should have this earthy smell and not smelling like rot. If you smell the later then there could have been some things that might have been included in the compost pile or the ratio of the greens and browns components is not correct.

One way to make certain that your compost pile has just the right combination of greens and browns components, is to get a compost pile of green material and put it in you compost bin. Follow it up with two compost piles of brown materials.

Keep this gong until you have a nice compost pile of leaves and grass that measures about three feet. At this high, you probably have a base measuring 3 feet also. One good thing of having this large a compost pile is that the greens and browns can easily and quickly break down.

If you want, you could add in a bucket of already finished compost pile to the newly formed compost pile. This will help start the process and begin the microbial activities in your compost pile.

Make sure that you add enough moisture to the compost pile as well. Keeping the compost pile damp will help quicken the breakdown of the organic materials. Add water to the compost pile and feel a sample. Compost pile should be damp, somewhat like a sponge.

There is a need to turn over your compost pile at least once a week to keep it loose allowing air into the compost pile and quickens the process of decomposition. After two months, you should have decent quality compost pile by now. The original materials you used should no longer be recognizable.

As you can see, making compost pile is quite easy and requires not too much of your time.