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From the Garden How to make your own compost - you can learn from my mistakes

I have had some God-awful compost heaps over the years – slimey, smelly, sludgy yokes that festered away in the corner of the garden, writes Michael Kelly.

I DON’T ALWAYS get it right but every year I think I am getting a little better at making compost so that I can improve my soil and give my veggies the nutrients they need to grow.

The key I think is to treat your heap (or in my case, five heaps) not as a place where you can happily dump all manner of stuff from the kitchen and garden, but as if you were making a loaf of bread – you have to make sure you have the right mix of ingredients, bake it well and treat it with a little love.

I have had some God-awful compost heaps over the years – slimey, smelly, sludgy yokes that festered away in the corner of the garden. I had to avoid making eye contact with them each time I make a trip there.

The problem, I think, is that composting is always explained in a way that makes it sound highly technical. It’s all carbon and nitrogen ratios and one would think you need a PhD in Chemistry just to get involved. Any time anyone tried to explain the process of making compost to me, my eyes would glaze over and I would hear soothing music in my head while they talked.

So let’s get the science bit out of the way. Don’t be alarmed. In order for the material you’ve dumped into your heap to turn in to compost, there has to be a mixture of nitrogen and carbon.

So forget the word ‘ratio’ – it’s simply a fifty/fifty split, and it doesn’t need to be too precise. The green stuff in the heap is high in nitrogen while the brown stuff is high in carbon (see tip below).

If you have a good mix of both, you will have the right balance and it will break down and turn in to compost quickly. Too much green and you will get a really wet, sludgy heap like many of my efforts over the years  -the result of adding too much grass clippings. Too much brown and you get a really dry heap that won’t rot quickly (but will rot eventually).

How long it takes to turn to compost depends on what’s in it – could be 4-6 months but you will know when it’s ready by the fact that you have a nice crumbly compost with no smell.

I like the idea of closing the gate on fertility – in other words, making enough compost so that you don’t need to bring any fertilisers, compost or manures into your garden from outside. In reality, I am a little ways off that.

You will get approximately 20-30 wheelbarrows of compost from each heap you make. That sounds a lot, but each spring you will need a wheelbarrow of compost for each square yard of veggie bed.

The Basics: Top Tips for Composting

The smaller the materials and the layers you put on the heap, the quicker it will break down. Think of it as your own digestive system – if you chew your bread it will be easy for your stomach to break down. If you swallow it whole, it won’t.

So as a rule of thumb, chopping the materials with clippers will help. And, if you have bigger items like stalks of cabbages etc, bash them up with a sledgehammer first.

After that, the key is layering. Spread the layers out – don’t leave it all in a big mound!

Add about a 3-inch layer of brown material and then a 3-inch layer of green material on top until you get a heap that’s about 4-5 foot tall and then leave it alone to rot down – don’t add anything else to it.

That means you probably need a minimum of two heaps. In practical terms, I often have far more green materials than I have brown – I usually end up dumping some greens in a pile beside the heap and waiting until I have a brown layer before adding them.

It’s counter-intuitive, but regular turning (monthly) will aerate the heap, which will help it to decompose – the more often you turn it the quicker it will rot. A well-layered heap will heat up quickly, rot down fast and uniformly, it won’t smell and should be easy to turn.

The brown layer can consist of straw, wood ash, cardboard, newspaper, small twigs, leaf mould, soil or garden “sweepings”.

The green layer could contain seaweed, grass, hedge clippings and kitchen waste (veg only).

You can have a completely open heap, or construct sides for it with timber or timber pallets – this makes turning a little easier. It should be about 4ft wide and deep.

Start with a brown layer such as straw or twigs of at least 10 inches. Cover the materials with cardboard or old carpet to keep the worst of the weather off them.

Recipe of the Week: Carrot and Squash Soup

It’s January so let’s be honest, we need lots of detoxifying and frugal soups. This one is delicious and if you’re lucky, you may still have all the ingredients in your larder or garden to make it entirely homegrown.

Ingredients:

  • 1 red onion, peeled and finely chopped
  • 2 cloves garlic, peeled and finely chopped
  • 2 tbsp olive oil
  • 4 large carrots, peeled and cubed
  • 1 medium squash, peeled, deseeded and cubed
  • Black pepper, freshly ground
  • 850 ml chicken or veg stock
  • 2-3 sprigs thyme
  • A handful of fresh parsley

Directions:

Sweat the onion and garlic in the olive oil over medium heat in a large saucepan for about 5-7 minutes.

Add the carrots and butternut squash to the pan.

Season, then cover with a lid and cook for another 10 minutes on a low heat until the vegetables start to soften.

Pour in the stock, add the herbs and bring to the boil. Now turn down the heat a little, and simmer for about 30 minutes.

Finally, use a hand blender or liquidizer to purée the soup. Reheat and serve.

Michael Kelly is an author, broadcaster and founder of GIY.

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    Mute Darren Davis
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    Jan 12th 2019, 2:16 PM

    Thanks for the recipes. The soup was lovely, I’ll try the compost one for lunch tomorrow

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    Mute Mal
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    Jan 12th 2019, 1:11 PM

    Thanks that does sound simple

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    Mute ianglen
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    Jan 12th 2019, 2:23 PM

    Neighbour put out a compost bin last at back of house and the rats had a field day.
    Put it as far away from your house if you can..

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    Mute Brian McCarthy
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    Jan 13th 2019, 4:20 PM

    @ianglen: you’re putting the wrong stuff in the composter
    if it’s attracting rats

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    Mute Sean
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    Jan 12th 2019, 2:59 PM

    Composting is amazing all right. Did you know that you can get rid of a 1000 pound cow in just six weeks by covering it in eight cubic yards of wood mulch? Basic recipe. Place the carcass on a bed of wood chips 2 feet deep, then cover it to a depth of about 4 feet, with at least 2 feet on the sides.It doesn’t attract flies or vermin or smell. It just disappears! All you are left with is some large bones.

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    Mute Garreth Byrne
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    Jan 12th 2019, 3:22 PM

    @Sean: How many suburban and town gardeners have got a 1000 pound dead cow to begin with?

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    Mute WoodlandBard
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    Jan 12th 2019, 4:18 PM

    @Garreth Byrne: i think this may have started as a Dublin gangster technique that eventually got adapted to farm animals.

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    Mute Garreth Byrne
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    Jan 12th 2019, 6:59 PM

    @WoodlandBard: I see. So composted dead cows and composted dead gangstas are equally effective in organic vegetable gardening, eh? IOFGA and the Soil Association might have reservations.

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    Mute Tweety McTweeter
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    Jan 12th 2019, 2:48 PM

    Dampening it down with a bleach mix every so often gets rid of the smell and kills off the yucky bugs and insects

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    Mute Ryan Dub
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    Jan 12th 2019, 5:26 PM

    @Tweety McTweeter: Do not put bleach in the garden.

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    Mute Brian Ó Dálaigh
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    Jan 12th 2019, 5:44 PM

    @Tweety McTweeter: would you tuck into a nice glass of bleach? If your answer is no, then do not put it on any compost that you intend to use for growing food. Also, if your compost smells that badly it means you’re doing it completely wrong.

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    Mute helen walsh
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    Jan 12th 2019, 4:45 PM

    Yes, how do you keep vermin away from compost heaps, their urine and droppings are bound to infect the compost heap…

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    Mute silentbob2012
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    Jan 13th 2019, 12:00 AM

    @helen walsh: simple. It’s not a black art.Everything for your compost heap must be uncooked and plant based. That means no cooked foods, no fats, no carbs, no oils. Egg shells excepted but it helps to break them down before chucking ‘em on your compost. Mix in cardboard, unbleached paper and newspaper from time to time, layered grass clippings, any garden vegetation as in the article above and away you go. If you’ve got rats or mice, you’ve been putting in foodstuffs.

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    Mute datagharch
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    Sep 18th 2019, 8:41 AM

    thanks alot

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    Mute David Cagney
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    Jan 13th 2019, 10:40 AM

    I don’t have a square yard, it’s more rectangular, with a circular end – so none of this is going to work.

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    Mute Ciarán Mac Cormaic
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    Jan 13th 2019, 4:55 PM

    @David Cagney: You might still be able to have the soup.

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