Making Your Own Compost

The initial investment in constructing your companion planted garden is significant the good news is that you can reuse the same mix for more than one season. Invariably though you will lose some soil mix through erosion, or whatever means and you will have to replace some of that compost. The most affordable solution is to make your own compost.

The old way to make your own compost involved building a structure that would retain the materials and getting in with a shovel once a week or so to ‘turn’ the compost. Today, there is another option in making compost the modern way.

There are spinning compost containers that rest on an axle and require just a few spins every week to speed up the composting process. You can create one of these with a fifty gallon plastic drum or purchase one from the garden store or Amazon.com: Achla Designs CMP-05 Spinning Composter Horizontal. We have our own DIY plans available in the following kindle book, also available at amazon.com: A Beginners Guide to Keeping Backyard Chickens – Breeds Guide, Chicken Tractors & Coops, Hatching & Raising Chicks Plus More… (Simple Living)

Homemade compost can be made with a lot of different items you throw away anyway:

 

Don’t ever attempt to compost scraps of meat, fat or bone. These can contaminate your compost and don’t break down into usable components for a garden. There are organic compost liquids that you can add to the compost pile or spinning drum to speed up the process. As the process can take close to six months to produce usable compost, it is a good idea to get your composting organized and started before you get ready for your planting.

Great compost bins, made from recycled wooden shipping pallets.