Everyone Should Be Composting
Every Autumn when I was a kid, I dreaded having to drag the raked up leaves up the hill to the compost pile in my backyard. Back then it was an annoying chore, but now my understanding of the benefits of composting makes me proud to have grown up with it. With grow lights, gardening is no longer just for the spring and summer. With indoor composts, neither is composting. There has been a revival in kitchen composting as a response to growing food waste and the promotion of sustainable living efforts. It is a way to make use of kitchen scraps and to decrease your contribution to landfills. Many people choose to compost because they do want to decrease the amount of waste that they produce. Some even want to create their own fertilizer for their gardens.
Some important rules for composting include:
1.) No meat or oils (You do not want to attract pests!)
2.) Balance your compost with greens (vegetable and fruit scraps), browns (leaves), and water (to have carbon, nitrogen, and water to break down the matter) If you have a home with a yard you can make a compost pile similar to the one I grew up with. A good base to start with dead leaves, sticks, and cut grass. For apartment dwellers, there are many ways to do it. You can simply store your food waste in a pail or bin and drop it off at a local compost or you can also create your own composting station using red wiggler worms. The worms will eat the scraps and create the compost. More detail on worm composting can be found here. If you think about it, composting your organic material does not take much more effort than just throwing it away. All you need is a pail or a bin, similar to a garbage bin, to store it in. You also need a place to drop off your material. There are many local efforts, all you have to do is look for them. A great place to start is at a farmer’s market or a greenhouse.
