The Magic of Compost for a Beautiful Organic Garden

06/08/16 The Magic of Compost for a Beautiful Organic Garden

Are you envious of your friends who have beautiful, flourishing organic gardens? Well, that used to be me as well, until I learned about the magic of compost. In my younger years, I was something of a “brown thumb”. I had this houseplant that I could not keep alive, no matter what I did. I fed it, watered it, kept it in a sunny window, cut off the dead parts, everything you are supposed to do to keep plants healthy and looking beautiful. But it just did not work with this plant.

So one day, in desperation, I took the plant to my friend Jean’s house, so she could have a look. Jean was a fantastic gardener. Her yard looked like it was right out of a home and garden magazine. She took the plant from me, kept it for a month, and returned it to me in a completely revitalized condition. That plant had never looked so good, even when I first brought it home from the store! “What did you do to my plant?” I asked. “Well, I just mixed in a little compost”, she said. She then showed me how she had compost bins situated in strategic locations throughout her yard, so that whenever she weeded the garden or raked leaves, there was a compost bin right there to throw in the yard waste. She added produce trimmings from the kitchen, and a little water during the hot summer, and had a steady supply of compost throughout the season and from the previous season. Well, I was sold. Years after that, when I purchased my first house, I started composting in my own garden, and never looked back!

So, you don’t have to make your own compost bin. You can certainly buy compost bins and cones from simple to super-fancy. They have ones that are enclosed and you turn a handle to rotate the compost, and I have even seen ones that look like a large chest of drawers, where each drawer contains compost at various stages of the decomposition process! But the truth is, you really don’t need something complicated or expensive. It is a simple process to assemble your own compost bin, or even multiple bins to scatter throughout your yard like my friend Jean did. I personally prefer the open kind where the air can get to all sides of the bin, because then you don’t have to turn the compost if you don’t want to. Just keep a few basic pointers in mind:

1. Put your bin (or bins) in a sunny spot in the yard.

2. Mix up your “green” (grass clippings, green branches and leaves, etc.) and your “brown” yard waste (such as raked-up leaves)

3. Keep it moist with a little water particularly throughout the dry season (we don’t have this problem here in the Seattle area, though!)

4. Don’t put dairy or meat kitchen scraps in the mix, because it will attract too many pests

I designed a simple, easy-to-make, cylindrical-shaped compost bin that costs $15 or less for the materials, can be sized to suit your own needs and specifications, and takes about 15 minutes to put together. What I especially like about it is that it blends into the rest of the yard. Check out our video on how to make this compost bin here: How to Build a Compost Bin in Under 15 Minutes – Cheap.

Once you get into using compost in your garden and see the beautiful results it produces, you too will never look back!