December 2008 - Issue:004

This E-zine is for anyone interested in producing healthy organic food from their home garden. If you know someone who may be interested in receiving The Food Gardener, then simply Forward this email to them.

If you have been sent this by a friend and like it, they can subscribe here.

Making compost

One thing I included on the Organic Garden Compost page was a link to a very informative E-book describing the Biodynamic method of compost making. While it was clear that this had a lot of very good information and would help anyone to produce really high quality compost, I pretty much missed the point!

The problem is that the word 'compost' has come to be used for many rather different things and, while the general process of composting is similar in most cases, the material produced and how it is used can be very different indeed.

Vermicompost, purpose-built compost heaps, speicalized methods for making mushroom compost and compost bins filled with kichen waste all produce 'compost', but different kinds. Vermicast and "Worm juice" are both good for building humus and encouraging earthworm activity in the soil; purpose-built heaps give good quality "true" compost that is good as both a kind of fertiliser and for improving soil structure; while compost bins are effective waste recyclers, providing a constructive use for household refuse. Unfortunately when making and using these materials, we often fail to think of how to make the best use of each one.

This is the first lesson I learned since writing my page on making compost. Using different types of compost together and in the same ways has resulted in problems with weeds, soil stagnation and even crop failures. These sent me back to re-think the whole subject and my first step was to begin with the method I knew produced the very highest quality compost - the Biodynamic method described in the E-book. But when I did this, I found the resulting material was quite different again from the other types of compost, so I read the E-book yet again and paid more attention to things I previously thought were just inflated claims that would help the author sell his book.

Biodynamic compost is not the soft, crumbly stuff we are used to thinking of as compost. It is a bit like a soft putty and so the problem I had was in working it into the soil. But again, my thinking was skewed by old habits. Other types of compost are used to add nutrients and build soil structure and need to be incorporated in large amounts to do this. Biodynamic compost adds humus and stimulates biological activity and so much smaller amounts are needed.

Once I got this into my head and used it as recommended in the E-book, I got a very different result. The material literally dissolved into the soil with very little effort and the whole character of the beds I used it on changed within a matter of days. It was as if all my previous (apparently only partially effective) efforts to improve the soil suddenly took effect.

The character of plants growing there also changed. Not just in terms of vigour, but also in there general 'health' and with a much more vibrant appearance.

Altogether, the lesson I have learned is that while everything I was doing to improve my soil was right (as described in my Soil improvement section), it was not enough. And of course, the compost I was making previously was also still as useful as ever, so I still send kitchen scraps to the compost bin and build a conventional compost heap every year, but from now on whenever preparing beds for a new crop - there will be one other task to perform. A small addition of biodynamic compost will always be a 'must' to properly complete the job!

The plan now is much clearer: I have started a small worm farm (more about this later) so I can use the 'juice' on the garden and the vermicast as intermittent layers in the compost bin to covert that into a more efficient vermicompost-like process. The resulting bin compost will then form part of the conventional heap I build to help ensure a more uniform product - used as compost traditionally is. My biodynamci compost heap will then produce far more material than I actually need, so I guess the neighbours will have to share it with me, as I really hate waste!

Already, this new approach has had valuable results. The productivity of my food garden has increased to the point where I can experiment with new crops and attempt projects that had been on the 'back-burner' far too long. You can look forward in the New Year to pages about rare and exotic vegetables - Yacon, Horseradish, Waterchestnuts and so on, Together with information on Truffles and Vertical gardening that I have been wanting to start on for some time now.

Why Not Pay It Forward?

1. My Food Garden - for general gardening topics and a directory for other places you can make a contribution.
2. My Favorite Vegetable - for information of specific types of vegetables.
3. My Herb Garden - for information about herbs and herb growing.
4. My Free Range - for stories about keeping chickens and other free range poultry.