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How to Get Started With Composting

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Sadie is sharing tips for how to get started with composting.
How to Get Started With Composting

Composting allows you to turn your food waste into free compost that is nutrient-rich and can be used for many things! Most likely, you're going to use it for gardening, so that is what this post will focus on. I personally love to use our food waste for composting, even though it's minimal. As you will find out, there are plenty of other things to add to your pile! It's important to keep your compost pile contained, though, so it doesn't attract animals.

How to Get Started With Composting

First you will need to decide exactly what type of composting you want to do. Earlier in the week we discussed three ways to start composting: traditional composting, tumbling composter, and vermiculture.

Dig in!

First things first, you need a composting bin! Decide on what size is best for your circumstances, and go from there. You can build your own compost bin from pallets or you can make a compost pile with hay bales, but I really like the Geobin.

Your compost bin needs to be placed in a semi-shaded area, directly on soil, and away from any direct water source. It should be easily accessible, and needs to have a lid (or cover).

What to Add to Your Compost Bin

To keep this post short, I won't be going into great detail about what exactly makes up your composting bin – but I will cover the basics. Ideally, you'll want to add equal parts of green stuff and brown stuff.

Green stuff such as fresh grass clippings, green garden debris, carrot peelings, eggshells, and weeds.

Brown stuff such as pine needles (small amounts), leaves, and twigs.

Other stuff should be added rarely, such as newspaper, cardboard, dryer lint, and wood chips.

What NOT to Add to Your Compost Bin

  • diseased plants
  • meats
  • dairy products
  • bones
  • paper (black and white newspaper is okay in small amounts)
  • dog or cat manure (though chicken manure is great for composting)

Read, read, read!

The Complete Compost Gardening Guide has been a very useful resource in starting my composting pile.

Composting For Dummies is another option for beginners that want to learn about composting. I love that you can get the Kindle version for less than $6!

Let it Rot!: The Gardener's Guide to Composting is a book I haven't purchased just yet, but it has amazing reviews. It's called the “composting bible”, even!

Get the kids involved!

Composting is many things, but above all, composting is fun! Get kids involved by getting them books like Worms Eat My Garbage: How to Set Up and Maintain a Worm Composting System! If you're a homeschooler, learning about composting covers many subjects – mostly science! Try the book Composting: Nature's Recyclers to supplement your science curriculum. Composting would make the perfect Unit Study!

Have you tried composting? I'd love to hear your tips in the comments!

More Gardening Tips:

 Thanks to Sadie of Slap Dash Mom for sharing her gardening tips.

About Alea Milham

Alea Milham is the owner of Premeditated Leftovers and the author of Prep-Ahead Meals from Scatch. She shares her tips for saving money and time while reducing waste in her home. Her favorite hobby, gardening, is a frugal source of organic produce for her recipes. She believes it is possible to live fully and eat well while spending less.

Comments

  1. mjskit says

    March 25, 2014 at 7:11 am

    We bought a compost tumbler a couple of years ago and love it! It composts very fast as long as it gets a lot of sun. We had it in a location where it was pretty much completely shaded during the winter and it did nothing. But now we’re moving compost from it to the garden quite often. Nothing goes to waste. Great article! Thanks for all of the links as well.

    Reply

  2. Thomas says

    September 22, 2016 at 9:22 am

    I started composting n wormjuice farming in a old plastic paint container, that provides me with regular wormjuice and compost that I use in plants I grow on my balcony. I’ve started to share some of the worms with friends because the bucket becomes filled with worms very quickly. All the veg and fruit peels gets chopped up and thrown in there. Now and then I’ll newspaper that was cut into smaller pieces and leaves collected from the common area of our block of flats.

    Reply

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Welcome. I'm Alea!

On Premeditated Leftovers I share simple recipes made with whole foods, practical shopping tips, time saving techniques, and meal planning strategies. I also share tips for minimizing food waste, so more of the food that is purchased ends up on the table.

While volunteering as a budget counselor, I realized that food is the element of most people’s budgets where they have the greatest control. I set out to develop low-cost recipes from scratch to prove it’s possible to create delicious meals on a limited budget. Eating well while spending less is about more than just creating recipes using inexpensive ingredients; it’s about creatively combining ingredients so you don’t feel deprived and are inspired to stick to your budget.