DIY Composting: Why Are We Paying Someone Else to Do What Our Gardens Can Do for Free?

There was a time when composting was simply part of having a garden.

Vegetable peelings, leaves, grass cuttings and dead plants did not automatically disappear into a council bin. Much of this material went onto a compost heap, into a compost bin or directly back into the soil.

Somewhere along the way, many of us stopped doing it.

Today it is perfectly normal to put garden waste into one bin and food waste into another, then have a lorry collect it so that somebody else can process it.

Council recycling schemes have undoubtedly helped divert organic waste away from general rubbish, and that is a good thing. But there is an interesting question:

Why send valuable organic material away from our homes, only to go out later and buy compost or fertiliser for the garden?

Home composting can be remarkably simple. You do not need expensive equipment, complicated machinery or a large garden.

At its simplest, composting is just allowing natural decomposition to do the work it has always done.

And there are several ways to do it.

Compost Is Not Waste

One of the biggest changes we can make is to stop thinking of vegetable peelings, leaves and plant material as rubbish.

They are raw materials.

Think about what happens when leaves fall naturally in woodland.

Nobody collects them into a council bin.

They fall onto the ground, fungi and microorganisms break them down, worms and other organisms process the material, and eventually nutrients return to the soil.

A compost heap is essentially our attempt to speed up and manage that natural process.

Instead of:

Kitchen -> bin -> collection lorry -> processing plant

we can sometimes have:

Kitchen -> compost -> garden

That is a wonderfully short recycling loop.

Why Did We Stop Composting?

Convenience is probably one reason.

Modern waste collection has made it incredibly easy to throw things away. Put food scraps into the appropriate container and somebody else deals with them.

Gardens have also changed.

Many houses have smaller gardens. Some have patios, decking or artificial grass. People may not grow vegetables or maintain large flower borders.

And composting itself has sometimes acquired an unfortunate reputation.

People imagine:

• bad smells;

• rats;

• clouds of flies;

• complicated turning routines;

• large unsightly heaps;

• or compost bins that remain full of half-rotted material for years.

None of those outcomes is inevitable.

A well-managed compost system can be remarkably clean and simple.

Method One: Trench Composting — Probably the Simplest Composting System of All

One of the oldest techniques requires almost no equipment.

Dig a trench.

Add suitable organic kitchen waste.

Cover it with soil.

Then let nature do the rest.

This is often called trench composting.

Imagine preparing an area of vegetable garden that you will not need for several months.

You might dig a trench perhaps around 30 cm deep, put a layer of uncooked vegetable peelings and garden material into the bottom, and then cover everything thoroughly with soil.

Microorganisms and soil organisms gradually break down the buried material.

By the time plants are eventually grown there, much of the material will have decomposed.

It Is Composting Without Making Compost

That sounds strange, but it is essentially what is happening.

You never produce a pile of finished compost that has to be moved.

The decomposition happens exactly where the nutrients will eventually be needed.

It can be particularly useful around:

• vegetable beds;

• runner bean trenches;

• unused sections of allotments;

• future pumpkin or courgette beds;

• and areas being prepared several months before planting.

A Simple Example

Suppose you are clearing your vegetable beds during autumn.

Instead of putting every vegetable trimming into the green waste bin, you dig a trench through an empty bed.

Over several days you add:

• carrot peelings;

• cabbage leaves;

• potato peelings;

• apple cores;

• damaged vegetables;

• coffee grounds;

• and small amounts of soft garden material.

Then cover everything with plenty of soil.

During autumn and winter decomposition takes place underneath the ground.

You have effectively turned part of the vegetable bed into an underground composting system.

What I Like About This Method

There is very little to see.

There is no large compost heap.

There is nothing to turn.

There should be little smell once the material is properly buried.

And there is virtually no equipment cost.

For someone wondering whether composting is worth trying, this might be the easiest place to begin.

Method Two: The Traditional Compost Bin

The second approach is the familiar compost heap or compost bin.

These come in almost every imaginable design.

You can buy:

• inexpensive plastic compost bins;

• wooden slatted bins;

• modular compost bays;

• insulated hot composters;

• tumbling composters;

• rotating drums;

• worm composters;

• and elaborate multi-chamber systems.

Or you can simply make your own.

Four wooden pallets secured together can create a perfectly serviceable garden compost bay.

The important part is not how attractive or expensive the container is.

The important part is what goes inside it.

Compost Needs a Mixture

One of the most common mistakes is filling a compost bin with one type of material.

A large mass of wet grass clippings, for example, can become compacted, slimy and unpleasant.

Composting generally works better when wetter, nitrogen-rich materials are mixed with drier, carbon-rich materials.

Gardeners often refer to these as greens and browns.

Typical Greens

These might include:

• vegetable peelings;

• fruit scraps;

• grass cuttings;

• coffee grounds;

• tea leaves;

• fresh weeds;

• soft green plant growth;

• and vegetable trimmings.

Typical Browns

These include:

• dry leaves;

• shredded cardboard;

• small amounts of plain paper;

• small twigs;

• chopped woody stems;

• straw;

• shredded egg boxes;

• and dried plant material.

You do not need to calculate an exact scientific ratio every time something goes into the bin.

Simply avoid creating a great mass of one wet material.

If the compost looks very wet, add some dry material.

If it looks extremely dry and nothing appears to be happening, add some greener material or a little moisture.

Cardboard May Be More Useful Than You Think

One particularly useful composting material is ordinary brown cardboard.

Many homes generate enormous quantities from internet deliveries.

Remove plastic tape and labels where practical, tear or shred the cardboard, and it can become a valuable source of dry carbon-rich material.

That cardboard can help balance grass cuttings and kitchen vegetable waste.

Suddenly two household waste streams can help solve each other's problems.

Kitchen scraps provide wetter green material.

Cardboard provides dry brown material.

Put the two together and you have the foundations of compost.

Does Compost Need Turning?

It helps, particularly if you want compost relatively quickly.

Turning mixes the material and introduces oxygen.

But this is one area where people can make composting sound unnecessarily difficult.

You do not necessarily have to turn a compost heap every few days.

For many ordinary garden compost systems, occasional mixing is perfectly adequate.

A garden fork can be used.

Some specialist bins make turning easier.

Tumblers allow the entire container to rotate.

More sophisticated insulated composters can maintain higher temperatures and process material considerably faster when managed correctly.

But speed is not everything.

If you have the space and patience, slower composting still produces useful material.

Nature is quite prepared to wait.

Two Compost Bins Can Be Better Than One

If you have enough space, having two compartments can make life easier.

One bin receives fresh material.

The second contains material that is finishing its decomposition.

When the first bin becomes full, leave it alone and begin filling the second.

By the time the second becomes full, the first may be ready to use.

For larger gardens, three bays can work even better:

1. fresh material;

2. partially decomposed material;

3. finished compost.

This makes moving material through the system much easier.

What Should Not Go Into an Ordinary Home Compost Bin?

This is where a little knowledge becomes important.

For a simple garden compost heap, I would generally avoid putting in:

• meat;

• fish;

• bones;

• dairy products;

• large quantities of cooked food;

• fats and oils;

• pet faeces;

• diseased plant material;

• persistent weeds containing mature seeds;

• plastic;

• glass;

• metal;

• glossy coated packaging.

Commercial and specialist composting systems may be capable of handling materials that an ordinary cold garden compost heap cannot process safely or effectively.

That is an important distinction.

Your council food-waste system may therefore still have a useful role for materials that are unsuitable for your own compost bin.

Home composting does not have to replace council recycling completely.

It can complement it.

What About Rats?

This is probably one of the biggest concerns people have.

A compost bin containing mostly garden material, raw fruit and vegetable waste is much less attractive than a heap regularly supplied with cooked meals, meat and fatty foods.

A secure bin also helps.

Some gardeners place wire mesh underneath compost bins if rodents are a particular problem.

The key principle is simple:

Do not turn the compost bin into a free restaurant.

Keep inappropriate food out of it.

What About Smells?

Good compost should smell earthy rather than rotten.

A strong unpleasant smell usually suggests that conditions have become too wet and oxygen-poor.

This is common when large quantities of grass clippings are packed together.

The remedy may be surprisingly simple:

Add shredded cardboard, dry leaves or other brown material and mix everything together.

Air matters.

A compost heap is a biological system.

The microorganisms doing the decomposition need the right conditions too.

Can Compost Really Save Money?

This is where home composting becomes particularly interesting for the Going Green household.

Garden centres sell:

• soil improvers;

• compost;

• mulches;

• fertilisers;

• organic matter;

• and planting mixes.

Yet many households are simultaneously paying to dispose of materials that can contribute to creating their own soil improver.

Home compost will not necessarily replace every specialist compost or fertiliser you buy.

Seed compost, ericaceous compost and specialised potting mixtures have particular properties.

But homemade compost can be extremely useful for:

• improving garden soil;

• mulching around established plants;

• vegetable beds;

• adding organic matter;

• improving soil structure;

• and feeding soil organisms.

Every bag you do not need to buy is a small saving.

Over many years, those savings accumulate.

Compost Is Really About Soil

Perhaps the biggest mistake is thinking that composting is simply a waste-disposal technique.

It is really about building better soil.

Healthy garden soil contains an astonishing community of organisms.

Bacteria, fungi, worms and countless tiny organisms interact with decomposing organic matter.

Adding compost helps improve the structure of many soils and increases their organic content.

A heavy soil may become easier to work.

A very light soil may retain moisture better when its organic matter improves.

And rather than continually treating the garden as something that needs products added from outside, we begin creating more of what it needs ourselves.

A Very Simple Household Composting Routine

You could start without making any major lifestyle changes.

Keep a small kitchen caddy for suitable vegetable and fruit scraps.

When it fills, take it outside.

Add it to the compost bin.

Cover it with a handful of dry leaves, shredded cardboard or other brown material.

Occasionally mix the contents.

Continue.

That is about as complicated as it needs to be.

What About Autumn Leaves?

Autumn provides one of the greatest free gardening resources of the year.

Leaves can go into ordinary compost, although large quantities may be better used to produce leaf mould.

Collect damp leaves into a simple wire cage, breathable sack or separate heap and allow them to decompose slowly.

It can take much longer than ordinary compost, but the resulting material is extremely useful in the garden.

Once again, nature is producing something valuable from material we often regard as rubbish.

What About Grass Cuttings?

Grass is both extremely useful and occasionally troublesome.

Fresh grass contains plenty of nitrogen and decomposes quickly.

But a thick layer can collapse into a wet, airless mass.

So rather than tipping the entire lawn-mower box into one corner, mix grass with dry material.

A layer of grass.

Some shredded cardboard.

Another layer of garden material.

Some dry leaves.

The exact arrangement is less important than avoiding a compressed heap containing nothing but wet grass.

Faster Composting — If You Want It

There are now composters specifically designed to accelerate the process.

Insulated hot composters retain heat.

Tumblers make mixing easier.

Shredders reduce woody garden waste into smaller pieces that break down more quickly.

Compost aerators can introduce air without requiring the whole heap to be turned.

For some households these can be worthwhile.

But I would not let equipment become a barrier to starting.

A £200 composter is not essential.

Indeed, one of the great attractions of composting is that it can cost almost nothing.

Start With What You Already Have

Before buying equipment, look around the garden.

Could you make a compost area from old timber?

Could three or four spare pallets become a compost bay?

Could an unused corner become a leaf-mould area?

Could an empty vegetable bed accommodate a compost trench?

Could cardboard deliveries provide brown material?

Going green does not always mean buying another product labelled "eco".

Sometimes it means making better use of what we already have.

A Small Experiment for the Garden

If you have never composted before, try this for one month.

Keep suitable uncooked fruit and vegetable waste out of the household rubbish.

Add it to a compost bin or trench.

Add cardboard and garden material.

At the end of the month, look at how much material you have diverted.

It can be surprising.

Then imagine doing that for a year.

And then imagine thousands or millions of households doing something similar.

The Council Bin Still Has a Place

There is no need to turn composting into an all-or-nothing argument.

Council food and garden waste collections are useful, particularly for households without gardens and for materials that are inappropriate for a simple home compost heap.

But if you have a garden, it seems slightly strange to export every leaf, grass cutting and vegetable peeling and then import bags of soil improver.

A more balanced approach might be:

Compost what you reasonably can at home and use council recycling for the rest.

That reduces waste while keeping valuable organic material within the garden.

My View: Composting Is One of the Simplest Forms of Going Green

I like environmental improvements that are understandable.

No complicated technology.

No enormous capital investment.

No smart app.

No subscription.

You put natural materials together.

Microorganisms break them down.

Worms join in.

Time passes.

And eventually you have something that can improve the soil.

There is something wonderfully satisfying about that process.

It turns "waste" into a resource in perhaps the most literal way possible.

Conclusion: Perhaps It Is Time to Bring the Compost Heap Back

Modern waste collection has made disposing of organic material incredibly convenient.

But convenience can sometimes hide value.

Vegetable peelings are not necessarily rubbish.

Leaves are not rubbish.

Grass cuttings are not rubbish.

Cardboard is not always rubbish.

Put together carefully, they become the raw ingredients for healthier soil.

You can make composting as sophisticated as you wish.

Buy an insulated hot composter.

Build a three-bay wooden system.

Use a rotating tumbler.

Or simply dig a trench, add suitable organic material and cover it with soil.

The important thing is to start seeing household and garden waste differently.

Perhaps one of the easiest ways to make our homes greener is not to invent another complicated recycling system.

It is to rediscover one our grandparents already understood:

Feed the soil, and let nature do the recycling.