Thursday, November 10, 2011

Composting 101

No, no, no.  Fear not.  I don't intend to teach anything about composting here.  I am the one doing the learning.
Do you compost?  Believe it or not, we never have.  Back in the Midwest, we'd plant a couple herbs and maybe a tomato plant or 2, but never had an actual garden.  We did have a fairly big garden our first full summer out West, but the yard was so small that there just didn't seem to be a place for a compost pile.
Well, we now have space for as many compost piles as we can create.  And, the (deer-proof) fenced garden is already here, so let the composting begin!
Mark built an enclosure from some old pallets that were - somehow - just here.  Have we mentioned that the man we bought the property from NEVER threw anything away and had lots of storage space for all his stuff?  Remember the HUGO, right?  Well, when he moved, he did take most of the "stuff", but was good enough to leave a fair bit of it behind.  Therefore, we have a couple piles of pallets sitting around - among other things :)


Our youngest daughter was excited to help with the new project, so she and I worked together to get started on our pile.  We layered in leaves, hay, newspaper, and the few bits of kitchen scraps we had.  She had lots of questions while we worked.  I tried to simplify things and just told her that we were making food for the garden.

"The garden likes newspaper?  Are you sure, Mom?"

I tried for a more scientific answer, but I'm not sure she followed me.  She loves the idea of composting, however, and was tickled to learn that she gets the permanent job of taking the kitchen waste out to the compost pile.
I'll tell you... between the chickens and the compost pile, there's nothing going to waste around here anymore :)

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