Tips to Really Get your Compost Heap Cooking
It seems that most organic gardeners love the idea of making their own compost, but some gardeners have trouble making it really happen. Don’t give up! There are ways to give your compost heap a boost and get it heating up again – creating beautiful, nutritious humus for your veggie garden.
OK, so after six months your ‘compost’ has remained unchanged from it’s original state? Remember there are certain conditions your heap needs to be able to actively turn it’s ingredients into compost. They are air and moisture. Here are some things you can try.
1. Turn your heap over, exposing it to air, watering if dry.
2. If your heap dries out it will stop breaking down. Water the heap every few days in summer if conditions are hot and dry.
3. Add ingredients that are as small as possible. Use a shredder, mulcher or lawn mower to chop up larger ingredients such as prunings and larger leaves.
4. To speed up the composting process add lots of nitrogen-rich ingredients such as clover, manure laden straws, herbal activators (see below), washed sea-weed or fishmeal.
Herbal Compost Activators – some herbs are well known as particularly impressive compost activators. Add them to your heap to speed up your results.
Comfrey (Symphytum officinale) is rich in calcium, nitrogen, phosphates and potassium. It has large hairy leaves that break down very quickly.
Dandelion (Taraxacum sp) also accelerates the breaking down of materials in the heap. It is rich in copper, potash and iron, all valuable goodies in your compost.
Valerian (Valeriana officinalis) has a reputation for attracting earthworms to the compost heap. It’s leaves are also rich in minerals.
Yarrow (Achillea sp) can have the most dramatic effect in your heap, even in small amounts. It will enrich your compost with nitrates, potash, phosphares and copper, so is a very valuable addition.
Tansy (Tanacetum vulgare) has the ability to concentrate potassium from the soil where it grows. Adding Tansy to your compost means adding potassium.
If you have the room, it’s best to have two or more compost piles on the go. One that you are preparing by gathering materials, one that is semi-matured and one that has already turned into that gorgeous, black, earthy plant tonic – ready to use.
One more tip is to make sure air can get to the middle of your heap, especially if you don’t plan to turn it often. Place garden stakes or pvc pipes through the middle of your heap so that you can ‘jiggle’ them every few weeks allowing air to the centre.
Try some of these tips and I’m sure you will speed things up for your compost heap and you will be topdressing your veggies with your own compost in no time.
About the Author
Hi, I am an avid organic gardener and recycler. I live on a small country property in South Australia. It is my mission to encourage as many people as possible to start organic gardening. Please visit my website for more great organic gardening tips & information.
Happy gardening, healthy living…
Julie Williams
www.1stoporganicgardening.com
How To Build A Career In Landscaping Yards - 6 Vital Tips
Starting a landscaping career is a great choice but you have to have the basic infrastructure for it and be ready with the manpower and equipment for it. However, you feel excited at the thought of doing a job where you have some exercise involved and will do a lot of walking around instead of the usual sedentary desk job.
1. The requirements of Landscaping Yards business
You will need to invest some money in this business when you start out. Landscaping yards does not only need a lawn mower but a lot of special equipment so that you can do a good job of it and satisfy your clients.
2. Equipment you will need for landscaping yards
As a professional in the area of landscaping yards you will need to have suitable equipment for each of the jobs involved. The main big expense would be a suitable truck to carry your equipment in back and forth. Other tools required are pruning tools, seed spreaders, weed wackers, leaf blowers or mulchers for cleaning up leaves in the autumn and many more.
3. A permit for the business
To carry out any business one needs a business permit, and you will have to get one for your landscaping business too. For inspection you will need to show the authorities an office space. You could make an office area in your home or hire space for this and then get your business permit.
4. Employees and their benefits
Once you have the business permit, to do the work efficiently and quickly you would have to hire at least two people who know about landscaping yards. Get the assistance of a financial advisor to find out about things like the rate of the salary and medical benefits for them.
5. Ways to find suitable employees
The best way to have a wide range of people to select from is to put an advertisement in the local paper or place one online. Shortlist those applicants who seem to be suitable, and interview them. Try and do a background check on them before you employ them to be sure that their credentials are in place.
6. Build up your business
Now that you have everything in place you have to get your business deals. You will have to place advertisements in the local dailies, in special gardening periodicals and online to get people to know about the company. A good way to have all the details done artistically with all that you can give your client by way of landscaping yards is a website of your own. Print visiting cards with your contact details so that when you visit other places to get business you can leave your card with them. Finally the best way to get the word around is by word of mouth – if you do a good job people will definitely recommend you to their friends.
About the Author
Abhishek is passionate about Gardening And Lawn care and he has got some great Lawn Care Secrets up his sleeves! Download his FREE 78 Pages Ebook, "Gardening Secrets For A Lush Garden!" from his website http://www.Gardening-Master.com/632/index.htm . Only limited Free Copies available.
