Composting

Stella and her grandpa James, have been preparing the community garden for winter. The garden is now full of brown piles of twigs, dead leaves, and green piles of weeds, dried up plants and rotten vegetables. What should they do with them? They could take the waste to a landfill. There, it would take up space and rot for a really long time, releasing harmful gases, such as methane, in the process.

Or, they can turn this waste into something useful that would actually help them grow more plants in the spring! First, they need to place a large, wooden crate with gaps or holes for air in a shady spot in the garden. Then, they need to put in a layer from the brown pile — the brown, dead leaves and twigs. If this layer seems very dry, some water can be added to it, to keep it moist. On top of this, comes a layer from the green pile — the weeds, dried up plants and rotten vegetables.

They could even add some fruit and vegetable scraps from the kitchen to this layer! Then, they should cover that layer with another brown layer, then another green layer, and so on, until all the waste is nicely layered in the wooden crate. Finally, they should add some earthworms — luckily, there’s plenty of them around! Once this layered pile has been created, it starts breaking down into simpler things: water, minerals, simple sugars and gases. This process is decomposition.

And the earthworms are very helpful in this process, they are decomposers. In a couple of months, the pile will turn into a dark mush — compost. We call this process of making compost, composting. Compost contains plenty of carbon from the brown layers and nitrogen from the green layers, as well as other nutrients — all very important for growing new plants! So composting turns decomposed organic matter into a natural, recycled matter fertiliser!

There are many benefits of composting, and of using compost as a fertiliser. It saves organic matter from going to a landfill and harming the environment by releasing methane. So composting helps reduce air pollution! Adding compost to plants helps them grow and improves soil health. Compost returns nutrients to the soil, nutrients which have been used up by plants.

This reduces the need for chemical fertilisers. Chemical fertilisers can be harmful to some living organisms, such as earthworms. Earthworms are important for keeping soil airy and for decomposing dead matter. So using compost is also better for these organisms. Compost helps soil retain more water too.

This means that less water is needed for watering plants, which can help reduce the effect of drought. Not everyone has access to a community garden and composting like Stella and grandpa James do. But you can still compost! You can, for example, build a smaller version of Stella and grandpa James’ compost bin, right on your kitchen countertop! You can put your food scraps in there and use the compost for indoor plants.

Or, you can take the food waste to a commercial organic waste bin, if there is one where you live. Waste from these bins is taken to large composting facilities where it has great conditions to decompose, so it often decomposes faster. This compost can then be purchased by farmers to fertilise their produce. While we should still take care and waste as little food as possible, some organic waste is unavoidable. And composting is a great way to make use of it!