On 27/04/2012 15:01, Martin Brown wrote:
On 27/04/2012 12:55, John Price wrote:
Still at the begining of my veg gardening, and am now looking at the
issue of composting. Googling yields a variety of
opinion/advice/equipment. At the risk of getting a thousand different
opinions, what is the "lived" experience here?

If you have room for two or preferably three heaps scale them so that
the amount of waste you have will fill two of them in a season.

For the structure of a compost heap I've seen plastic bins galore,
wood-panel boxes with and without front removal, suggestions for
containing it in a wire fence etc etc. My local council flogs 330Litre
plastic bins for £19.

Up to you, but old palettes and former shed doors can be had for free.
If you don't mind what it looks like then they are fine. Whatever wood
you use is going to rot away after a few years anyway.

Whichever structure you use, there are products to add to them, with
conflicting advice about whether they are needed. Likewise there are
different views on whether to keep mixing the content or not, and
whether you need a special tool to do that with or not.

For a beginner it might be worth buying a packet of proprietory Garotta
activator to start things off well. But so long as you add a decent
amount of stuff at a time and don't squash all the air out it should go
reasonably well with or without. Ignore all the obsessive US advice
about the right ratio of N to C it really doesn't matter. Keeping it
from drying out completely is important during summer.

Turning it completely is too much like hard work. I just fold the outer
edges into the middle before adding the next layer of fresh material.

Why isn't life simple??!!!

In my garden the most consistent matter is a lot of lawn cuttings on a
weekly basis, then periodic hedge trimmings from a fair amount of
privet and Leylandii, lots of Autumn leaves and sporadic stuff from two
ponds. Then there is the household waste. I can easily get rid of
excess amounts of lawn stuff into the council bins for garden waste.

Do the autumn leaves separately in an old bin or dalek for leaf mould
(takes a couple of years). Many dead leaves like beech have powerful
antifungal agents in them and will stall a compost heap. I use my
"green" bin for leaf mould production.

There is also a question mark in my mind about the economics of this.
If I were to buy a plastic bin or the materials to make a wooden one,
how much would I save overall as opposed to buying compost from the
council (after giving them all my garden waste to make it!!).

All views welcomed - many thanks

You do get the advantage of turning all your green waste into nice
friable organic mulch by using a compost heap (or two).

As a general rule the larger the compost heap the quicker it will rot.
Of course if your garden is small that will not be much use. I have a
large garden and have three compost heaps (built from free scrap timber)
each about a meter cube. One in use, one rotting the third being filled
as plants become available. Works well for me, about a yearly cycle.

--
Residing on low ground in North Staffordshire