Composting 101: Learning about God’s Original Recycling System

[Ed. note: this article is part of our series of weekly family activities called Family Fun, published on Fridays]

A compost system is essential for your sustainable yard, one which produces little waste and requires few inputs from outside.  It also demonstrates the beauty of God’s original no-waste system – microbes we never see, along with those humble earthworms, are quietly doing one of the most important jobs on the planet – nutrient recycling. Waste becomes plant food. Plants become people and animal food. It’s an amazing system we should take time to appreciate and thank God for!

Our soil here in Atlanta is so high in clay we can make pots out of it! But spending money on fertile soil is wasteful, so what to do? Compost! Taking stuff we don’t want (kitchen scraps and yard clippings) and turning it into something valuable just seems like a no-brainer.

While there are thousands of books and websites out there on composting, you don’t need a degree in microbiology. There are a few basics to remember in making it work well, and your children will enjoy learning too.

Fun facts about soil

Give your children a teaspoon and have them fill it with soil. Can they see anything moving around in it? There might be a worm, but it’s teeming with tiny creatures called microbes, only visible under a microscope. Guess how many there are.  In healthy soil there are about a hundred thousand protozoa, thirty million fungi, and two billion bacteria! These little guys work nonstop, transforming dead stuff in the yard into fabulous, fertile compost. Compost feeds plants so they produce more food for you and for the animals and birds that visit your yard. And like your kids when they play hard or work hard and get hot and sweaty, the microbes give off heat when they work. A working compost pile will get so hot you can even see steam rising off it on a chilly day!

Find the Right Location

Find a partly shady spot. Too much sun will overcook it, but a little sun in winter will help warm it. Good drainage is also important. For aesthetic reasons you may want it behind a shed or bushes. Make sure there’s easy access for adding to it and turning it.

Choose a Type

Container or loose pile? Containers will keep more critters out than a pile, and keep it a little neater. Open or closed container? Closed containers keep out all the critters and are more aesthetic, but the simplest (a trash can with holes) are hard to turn, while the most elaborate (rotating drums) are expensive. You also have to add water to closed containers, whereas open bins let in the rain. I opted for an open bin because it is simple to build and use.

Size: It should be at least 3 feet in each direction to function best. You also need space to access it and turn it. If you have a very large yard, generating lots of leaves, grass clippings, and so on, you may want to create a larger system.

Build A Structure

There are many great plans for do-it-yourself containers on the internet, from simple to elaborate, including a home-made rotating drum. See what suits your skills and materials. The multi-bin approach is very efficient: you have one pile “cooking” that you don’t add to, and another one to which you add fresh materials. Scout the streets on trash day for stuff you can use, such as boards or pallets. Wire or plastic mesh of various sorts isn’t too expensive. Salvaging materials and building the bin can be a family project.  We found some chicken wire  and posts in the garage and thoroughly enjoyed putting something together in about an hour. Take care, the edges of the wire are sharp after cutting, and I used a staple gun to attach the wire – small children should not handle a staple gun!

Know (and Find) Your Ingredients

The essentials are simple. The main thing is that your microbe buddies need a balanced diet just like humans do. Their food is divided into greens and browns and they need about a 1:4 ratio of greens to browns by volume. You just have to know what’s what. Review these groups with your kids and recruit them to find sources from around your house and yard. You might even make a chart laying out the “recipe” for compost with pictures of the ingredients!

Greens:

• Fresh clippings: fresh leaves, green grass, flowers, green weeds
• Fresh manure (horse, chicken, rabbit, cow – NOT dog/cat poop)
• Kitchen scraps (fruit, vegetables, coffee grounds, tea bags, egg shells – NOT meat, oil, dairy, whole eggs, or cooked foods)

Browns:

• Dry leaves
• Dry grass & trimmings

Greens are high in nitrogen, and decompose quickly, but then turn to a slimy, wet pile devoid of air which then slows further decomposition. Browns are high in carbon, and also provide an airy structure. Without browns, your compost pile will stall and stink. Without greens it will just take a really long time, as you won’t get so many microbes. Smaller pieces will break down quicker than large ones so shred leaves and clippings before adding if possible. You can do it with a lawn mower, running it over your pile of leaves, or use a bagging lawn mower and collect the leaves as you mow the grass instead of raking.

Start off with 4" of brush and twigs