How Does Composting Work?

It is the breakdown of tissues and compounds into simpler substances, which act as soil nutrients.
Put a pile of leaves, a cardboard box and a watermelon in your back yard, exposed to the elements, and they will eventually decompose.

How long each takes to break down depends on a number of factors:
o What are the materials made of
o How much surface area is exposed
o The availability of moisture and air

Organic Materials

Backyard composting is a process designed to speed up the breakdown or decomposing of organic materials. Let us take a closer look at how we manipulate the process and speed things up.

Here I use the term microbes, which include microscopic organisms and worms amongst a whole slew of “things.” Microbes live in the soil; they are the key to composting. Normally, they eat small tidbits of organic matter such as leaves and twigs that nature provides. The more these microbes have to eat the more efficient they can work. A lot of the things you call waste – for example, banana peels, rotten apples, brown wilted lettuce, fallen leaves and weeds from your garden – are food for these microbes. Meat products should not be used.

Nitrogen Inside Foods

• If a compost pile or compost bin smells it is because of meat products. They will eventually break down, but meat slows down the composting process. Microbes need carbon and nitrogen.
• Some things high in carbon include paper, sawdust, wood chips, straw, and leaves.
• Some things high in nitrogen include food, grass clippings, and manures. Be sure to include a mixture of wastes high in nitrogen in your compost pile. The smaller the chunks are the faster they will break down. So cut up that apple. Break up those twigs, your compost pile will reward you for your effort.

Surface Microorganisms

The more surface area the microorganisms have to work on, the faster the materials will decompose. It is like a block of ice in the sun: slow to melt when it is large, but melting very quickly when broken into smaller pieces. Chopping your garden wastes with a shovel or a machete, or running them through a shredding machine or lawnmower will increase their surface area, thus speeding up your composting

• Sufficient air in the pile encourages microbial growth and speeds decomposition. We have all had the experience of smelling a mass of wet grass clippings

Ability For Air To Get Inside

Be sure your compost container had holes to allow air to get into the compost pile. These microbes need air to survive. If possible, stir or turn your compost pile every week or so to let in more air. If you do not get enough air into your compost pile, other organisms take over and give off a nasty. They also work a lot slower. I think you would prefer in your compost pile! Also, wet your compost pile. Your compost pile should be about as moist as a sponge that has just been wrung out. If there is not much rainfall, add water to your compost pile.

Air Temperature Inside Compost Bin

Compost piles should range in temperatures of about 90 to 140 degrees Fahrenheit or 32 to 60 degrees Celsius. Higher temperatures produce will kill major disease organisms and fly larvae, help kill weed seeds, and provide a good environment for the most effective decomposer organisms If the temperature is too low in your compost pile, many of your microbes will die, and those other microorganisms will take over. You know the slow smelly ones.

How Heating Affects Creating Soil Compost

The plant matter will require heat and moisture for quick breakdown. The summer sun will provide the heat, but it will be the gardener’s responsibility to soak the compost area from time to time for the moisture.

Size Of Compost Pile

If your compost pile is too small, it will be cold. The best way to keep it warm is to build a pile at least three feet x three feet x three feet (one meter x one meter x one meter).
Extremes of sun, wind, or rain can adversely affect this balance in your pile.

Understanding For Effective Composting

Understanding these key factors when composting allows for efficient, quick break down of kitchen and yard wastes, turning them into “Black Gold”!

Conclusion: If you supply all these things – food, air, and moisture in a good-sized pile – You will get your compost in about six weeks. The larger the pile the longer it will take. A poorly attended compost pile can take years to decompose.

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Mushroom compost is a product which is used by gardeners and landscapers all over the world, the product you actually buy is the by-products of the growing process after the mushrooms are harvested. This article aims at providing you with the information so you can make your own mushroom compost and save some time and money.

The ingredients you need to start to make mushroom compost is manure, hay, poultry manure, gypsum and mushroom spawn as well as a large compost bin and steam machine. Once you have these ingredients you are ready to go.

1. You need to begin by mixing the gypsum and manure.

2. You now need to get your compost bin and line the bottom with the just mixed manure and gypsum and leave it for 2 or weeks. After this has happened the bin needs to be covered to allow it to become hot and all the organic matter also decompose.

3. The steam machine needs to be used indoors this allows the compost to pasteurize. Make sure the room has ventilation to allow the steam to blow inside the room till it reaches an approximate of 1600.

4. Once the compost is pasteurized it needs to be placed on trays and the mushroom spawn added and mixed thoroughly.

5. Then added peat moss to the tray and this needs to be kept inside and the humidity and the temperature of the room controlled. The growth of mushroom then can be expected within 30 days.

A quality mushroom can be grown with the help of horse manure. The same can be purchased from the shops or in the case of the fresh manure 20% of wet straw has to be added and to be left outside in the heap. After a few hours the heaps will become hot in the centre. The process has to be repeated and it has to be kept moist. Once it has finally become rotten the centre will no longer be hot.

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I was wondering about conditioning my garden soil?

Would it suffice for me to top dress a bed with soil conditioner or compost. Or, would it work if I took a shovel and pushed it into the ground and opened a slit, and then put some soil conditioner or compost into the slit? It wouldn’t be the same as working it into the entire soil bed, but at least there would be a little organic material in there.

Your Answer. I was just reading about this type of renovation to a garden bed. The writer was explaining that it is good to replenish organic matter every two years and one did not have to tear up the entire plot, but could incorporate it with digging down a foot or two, without disturbing the root systems of the existing plants. Fertilizer can be applied throughout the summer and this is called side dressing. Top dressing is merely laying organic matter on the surface. It will be beneficial, but will take much more time for the nutrients to reach down via leaching into the roots.

If there are no plants in this bed, you may dig all through it and add organic material, such as compost, dried leaves, peat moss or leaf mold. If plants are growing there now, then carefully dig away from the plants and add. Assume that the root systems will extend at least as far as the reach of the plant branches.

Here are some items to purchase and spade in. Read on with descriptions and several websites with lots of info for you, too much to print here!

• Perlite
• Vermiculite
• Dolomite Lime
• Magnesium Sulfate
• Seaweed Meal
• Soil Moist

http://dmoz.org/Home/Gardens/Soil_and_Additives/Fertilizers

This is one thing I just harp upon:

Soil drainage is critical to survival and growth of most landscape plants, especially evergreen trees and shrubs. When the rate of water movement through soil is restricted by fine-textured clay soils, subsoil, hard pan, or other material difficult to penetrate, a saturated zone may develop in the root zone of plants. Spaces in the soil normally containing air are filled with water, resulting in saturated soil. Wet soils cause more problems to landscape crops than any other single cause. When drainage is poor, roots are injured from the lack of oxygen, fertilizer uptake is limited, and plant growth is reduced. Soil moisture problems can be solved by installing surface and/or internal drainage.

http://www.ag.ohio-state.edu/~ohioline/hyg-fact/1000/1002.html

Building Fertile Soil

Healthy soil = healthy plants: when you build and maintain fertile soil rich in organic matter, you literally lay the groundwork for thriving plants that can develop quickly, resist pests and diseases, and yield a bountiful crop.

http://zzyx.ucsc.edu/casfs/gardenideas/soilfert.html

The ideal soil would have sand, silt, clay and organic matter in about equal amounts. It would also be uniformly mixed to at least twelve inches deep. The subsoil would allow the excess water to drain away. No soil is ideal but soil can be improved with soil amendments and drainage.

Amendments that are commonly added to soil are:

• Sand or Profile Soil Conditioner: to improve aeration and drainage.
• Compost: to add organic matter, nutrients and to improve aeration and drainage.
• Lime or Sulfur: to raise or lower pH.
• Fertilizers: to add specific nutrients.
• Sharp sand or Mason’s sand creates spaces much better than river sand

http://www.rodsgarden.50megs.com/improvingsoil.htm

http://www.discountgarden.com/soiladditives.html

http://www.scdhec.net/recycle/html/compost.html

http://www.dinosoil.com

This was a first garden in this house. We have raised beds and had special soil called 4-way garden soil brought in. We tested the soil and had to add a bit to it to reach where we wanted it to be.

We had hail in June and it did stunt some of the growing, but we got a fair amount of produce. Our tomatoes had no real flavor. We planted Roma, Early Girl and Sweet 100’s. All were rather tasteless.

Our green peppers tasted good as did the carrots, radish, cauliflower, broccoli.

The watermelons and cantaloupe did not have much taste either. We got a lot of melons, just no flavor. What could it be?

We had no pests and no weeds to speak of either. Did we water too much? We did not fertilize since the soil was good. We had a lot of ladybugs.

Response. It is a hard call, as reading soil test results would assist. Take in some samples next spring as soon as you can dig, from a depth of 6-12″, in various locations, labeled, to your local Ag Inspection lab or Extension Service [even a nearby school or research facility for farmers and gardeners.]

The lack of added fertilizer is suspect. Even if the newly added soil was fine, with many spring and summer rains and hand waterings, the food leaches down below the root systems so is not available to the plants as they produce fruit and vegetables. This can lead to bland, tasteless food.

The hail and ladybugs would have no effect on flavor. Overwatering would lead to root, stem and blossom rot, and melons need plentiful water, so this also is not a factor. The soil and fertilizer are the issues which need to be analyzed next spring.

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