What kind of stuff do you put in your composte?

OK, so I'm taking the advice of another DG'er and asking my big question: What goes in composte?

I've heard some say things like scraps from the kitchen, dead flowers, etc... I'm new to gardening, but am taking it by the horns and going ALL THE WAY!!! LOL... I've never had a composte pile, but it sounds as if it's important, or at the very least, popular!

Could I get feedback on what goes in composte? Or at least what each of you put in your composte? Also, do you till it in your garden soil? Or just place some underneath of your plants?

I put everything except meat and dairy products. When it is ready I just tuck it under my plants in the garden. Keep adding things to the compost and turn it every few days. You'll know when its done.

This is only tangentally related to a real answer (Hi again!),

I don't have a compost pile, but I do compost directly in my beds. Sort of.

I started my beds with hay bales (see the Bale Gardening forums for some killer ideas of how to do it), so my first layer was cardboard, and then the hay on top of that. In between the bales, I stuffed veggie scraps from the kitchen, shredded newspaper and cardboard, old leaves, more hay, and some manure.

On my first bed, which is now almost 1 year old, I harvested, then took out the strings so that I had loose hay left. I did NOT till this. I raked it flat, added some more shredded newspaper and cardboard, and then filled the bed the rest of the way with leaves. And then planted.

Until the plants actually go large enough that I could not dig between them, I would then occasionally bury the vegetable scraps. So far that bed has some VERY strong plants, with lots of happy green, and the tomatoes there are flowering and fruiting and looking great!

A compost pile is a great thing. You can put all the stuff that I list, as well as manure, and you will create some wonderful humus to use in the garden.

But you don’t necessarily HAVE to have a pile or bin, as I am learning. A pile or a bin is nice (and I want to have one of the spinny bins next year), but the layering of your growing media can produce some spectacular results, even without tilling.

I break the rule and put dairy and meat scraps in my pile. It is far away from the house and if a critter goes for the meat, I consider them turning up the pile for me to get to the meat a favor. I also add junk mail to the pile - it is almost pure manure anyway.

Yah! Another composter! There's a pretty amazing amount of stuff that you can put in your compost. And I've actualy seen a big difference in the amount of stuff we send to the landfill. My big trash can gets about half as full as it used to.

Here's a link to a good list on what to use and what it contianes.
(http://www.compostinfo.com/tutorial/CanICompostIt.htm)

Biggest thing tho, don't stress too much about making it perfect. Compost happens in nature all the time without anyone fussing over it. You can manage it to make it faster but it'll happen for you anyway.
=)

yes, it makes me sad when I see people worrying about what percentages of this and that to put in...weighing things...compost happens, it isn't really a set in stone science. If you toss stuff in there nature will do its thing for you...enjoy it!!

We ended up with 22 wheelbarrow's full of compost last summer.

Wow. That's great. I have a pretty small yard so don't produce a ton of compost. But still worth it=)

I remember there being a couple articals on composting here on DG LiveLaughLove.
Give a a minuet and I'll see if I can find the links for you.

Edited to add-
(http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/search.php?q=composting)

This message was edited Apr 9, 2009 1:27 PM

try googling 163 things to compost.....

Grass clippings, leaves, raw food scraps, raw fruits & veggies that have gone bad or are past their prime to be eaten, fruit and veggie peels/skins, dead plants, newspapers, and paper towels that haven't been used to wipe up grease and food.

duchess, that's a great link to the Florida "Can I Compost?" chart. I can never remember which are the browns and which are the greens. I have reformatted the chart in Word to be easier to read and since I don't have a color printer I removed the colors. Anyone wants a copy just dmail me with your email address, I'll send it along.

When I first started I got very confused when trying to balance my pile with just the right proportions of greens to browns. I don't worry about it anymore (it's been 3 years), just throw stuff in there. When I need to get it cooking I stop at 3 or 4 Starbucks on my way home and get 30 to 40 pounds of used coffee grounds. I add this in layers with llama droppings from a local llama farmer, watering as I go. Generally 4 or 5 kitty litter buckets of llama pellets to that much coffee grounds. The pile gets up to 160 degrees in about 24 hours and will hold that temp for 3 to 4 days then slowly drop. I do this as often as my energy level allows. ;~)

My problem with compost is not having enough 'green'. We do have horses, goats and rabbit. Rabbit bedding & manure goes in directly, goat manure is near impossible to "harvest" as it is not much bigger than rabbit's and is in open pasture. If I use 'fresh' horse manure, will it heat up? THen how long do I need to wait before it can be used if fresh manure was used. I have been only using the neighbor's well aged manure. No one around here has grass, so none of that to add. Maybe I could troll the housing developments to look for people mowing their useless grass and bring bags with me to fill up. I guess I can watch for when they trim the street trees and get some of that after they have been chipped. One neighbor has had them drop off their hole load and he has his whole yard covered with leave and bark chippings (word?). Keeps dirt from blowing around.

Mary, I will dmail you for that list since you have done the work already - thank you.

Lynda

Too bad that no one has grass. My husband will often "steal" clippings from the neighbors that don't use pesticides and stuff. The neighbors don't care, since it would go to landfill anyway, and I like it because it makes some killer bedding for the plants.

It occurs to me that I have broken the no meat/dairy thing a couple times, and the results were interesting. I get raw milk, and usually drink it all over the course of time, but there were a couple times when I did not drink it all because I was out of town, and it went sour. So I poured the soured milk into the garden. I figured that it was natural, and did not have any nasties, so it should not hurt.

Currently, my tomatoes are growing where I poured it, and they are healthy and strong and have some of the absolute strongest stems I've ever seen. Maybe they like raw milk too.

I would think the milk would give them extra calcium. I've read about using powdered milk with tomatoes so should be the same principle.

That explains it. Now I'm pondering getting a gallon every once in a while, just to pour on the beds. *snicker*

Here is a pic of mine. This is the "working" heap. I add the kitchen scraps to this one and keep it moist. It has a plastic cover around the sides, and sometimes the top, to keep this moisture in.

Here is the "holding bin". This is where I put the bags of leaves and stuff I scrounge, people bag them for me and set them out by the road!!! It's for large amounts of stuff and overflow. It goes into the working pile when I remove done stuff and turn it.

That's a nifty idea and a great way to contain your pile!

margocstn - everything I have read said the pile/bin is supposed to breathe, that is why they have openings on the sides for air to get in otherwise with moisture it can get slimy rotten.

The plastic is not tight against the wire. The wire is not perfectly round so there are big spaces, plenty of air circulates around it. I had trouble keeping it damp before I put it on. I might take it off later, it was cold and dry when I made it. I made it by using cable ties around paracord that the plastic was folded over. It's steamy and silver right now. It actually smells like menthol, or mint or something.

That's a cool smell. Most folks are afraid of bad smells from compost

I kind of like the way the smell of compost changes depending on what you put it. Right now mine smells citrusy and kind of tropical (lemmons and pinapple went in). Tho I do have to admit that using the black plastic bins it can be really difficult to get air to the bottom layers. Pulled some last weekend that was none to fresh.

Great thread! Last year I was able to manage my compost much better than this year.. (now I have chickens)

So.. I built a raised bed thinking I would just put a few leaves out there.. WOW.. it is awesome! Composted so much faster and better than in the biostacker bins. Now I'm moving everything out there.. it's loaded with worms and very wonderful earthy smell..
I have gone ahead and used compost that wasn't completely finished.. better than nothing I figure!
Today it's kinda just sitting there, so I poured some Molasses in to get things goin.. I've even used alfalfa pellets in the winter for greens..

I don't have hard and fast rules but I tend to avoid weeds that have seeds or are likely to grow from cuttings. (morning glory especially as well as mint) and things that are greasy. I have read that the critters that do a lot of the work to make compost don't like oil. So I exclude meat because of the oil and the propensity of nasty critters being attracted, even though it is an enclosed barrel type. Too many raccoons around here to risk attracting them. Or rats. I eat a lot of rice and sometimes notice that my "let compost happen" approach does not let the rice break down as well as other scrap. What go in are grass clippings, all vegetable scraps, dirt from annual and dead perennial pots, leaves and just about anything that will break down within a year of mostly neglect. I do add water in the summer months and aerate when I'm in the mood.

We don't have any kind of container for our compost; it's just out in a pile behind our storage building. We add leaves and grass clippings as well as kitchen scraps and dead plants. Sometimes some of the kitchen scraps start growing in it. We add dry molasses to it from time to time as well as coffee grounds. The neighbor's cats use it as a litterbox (ugh!), but I figure it's all good. I just love the earthy "dirt" smell of it when I go out to turn it! So far, it's been great for our garden!

My compost pile is very neglected. Any organic (biodegradeable) matter from the property goes in there. Kitchen waste, chicken coop bedding, weeds, small sticks, old potting soil, grass clippings, leaves, fresh farm manure from a neighbor, any dog poo that gets raked up with the grass clippings. The dogs get all the leftover meat and dairy scraps so that never seems to make it into the pile. If it does, they gladly dig it out. In fact, I think they do a decent job of aerating it when they dig through it. I never aerate it.

This fall, when I'm putting the veggie beds down for the winter, I'll sift everything through a square sifter I made out of 2x4's and hardware mesh, What goes through the sifter and into the wheelbarrow gets put on the garden beds and in a storage bucket for seedlings next spring. What's left over gets tossed next to the old pile, thus aerating, turning and harvesting all at once. I never worry about the right proportions. I might water it a couple times a summer when I drag the hose back there to water the raspberry beds during a dry spell. Might. It's in the shade under a few old pine trees so that helps to moderate the temp.

I know I don't get the "maximum amount possible" but I don't break my back either. And I've still got a good supply of 2-year-aged horse manure to hold me over until this fall. There are just more important things for me to be doing that turning a 2 cubic yard pile of compost every couple weeks.

Thanks for all the great info! I only have a small bin on my deck as I have just started this process. I'm starting small since I am so new, but I can see how this would be very addicting :)

I add coffee grounds with the filter, egg shells, toilet paper and paper towel cardboard tubes, cardboard egg cartons, raw veggie and fruit scraps. I even threw some wild chives in there that I cut out of the yard (after salvaging the edible bits). I also have some ash from my fireplace I saved, plan to toss some of that in as well. We will be cutting the grass for the first time this season this week, so I will have grass clippings and some raked leaves to add as well.

I have read to avoid oils, newspaper or cardboard with color print, glossy pages, meat, bones, and also large amount of citric fruits and onions. My bin is really small, so I'm trying to be careful to avoid things like these.

Welcome Crafty,

Just for fun google "163 things to compost" and see what you think.