Compost

“ The growth response from compost also depends on the soil's temperature. Just like every other biological process, the nutrients in compost only GROW the plant when they decompose in the soil and are released. Where summer is hot, where the average of day and night temperatures are high, where soil temperatures reach 80 degree for much of the frost-free season, organic matter rots really fast and a little compost of average quality makes a huge increase in plant growth. ”

“ The activities of fungi and bacteria are the most potent forces making nutrients available to plants. As useful as tilling rock powders into soil may be, the intense biological activity of the compost pile accelerates their availability. And the presence of these minerals might well make a compost pile containing nutrient-deficient vegetation work faster and become better fertilizer. Were the right types of rock dust available and cheap, I'd make it about 5 percent by volume of my heap, and equal that with rich soil. ”

“ Making compost is also a "personal good." For a few hours a year, composting gets you outside with a manure fork in your hand, working up a sweat. You intentionally participate in a natural cycle: the endless rotation of carbon from air to organic matter in the form of plants, to animals, and finally all of it back into soil. You can observe the miraculous increase in plant and soil health that happens when you intensify and enrich that cycle of carbon on land under your control. ”

“ There is a great deal of confusion in the gardening world about compost, organic matter, humus, fertilizer and their roles in soil fertility, plant health, animal health, human health and gardening success. Some authorities seem to recommend as much manure or compost as possible. Most show inadequate concern about its quality. The slick books published by a major petrochemical corporation correctly acknowledge that soil organic matter is important but give rather vague guidelines as to how much while focusing on chemical fertilizers. ”

“ When it is near the time for applying the compost to the field, or of feeding it to the crop, the fermented product is removed in waterproof carrying baskets to the floor of the court, to the yard, such as seen in Fig. 126, or to the street, where it is spread to dry, to be mixed with fresh soil, more ashes, and repeatedly turned and stirred to bring about complete aeration and to hasten the processes of nitrification. ”

“ As mixtures of manure and bedding were brought out from the cattle shed they were thinly layered atop thin layers of mixed vegetation brought in from the dried reserves heaped up adjacent to the compost factory. Each layer was thoroughly wet down with a clay slurry made of three ingredients: water, urine-earth, and actively decomposing material from an adjacent compost pit that had been filled about two weeks earlier. This insured that every particle within the heap was moist and was coated with nitrogen-rich soil and the microorganisms of decomposition. ”

“ As each of these materials is acquired it is temporarily placed next to the heap awaiting the steady outpourings from our 2-1/2 gallon kitchen compost pail. Our household generates quite a bit of garbage, especially during high summer when we are canning or juicing our crops. But we have no flies or putrid garbage smells coming from the compost pile because as each bucketful is spread over the center of the pile the garbage is immediately covered by several inches of dried or wilted vegetation and a sprinkling of soil. ”

“ The main difference between composting in heaps and natural decomposition on the earth's surface is temperature. On the forest floor, leaves leisurely decay and the primary agents of decomposition are soil animals. Bacteria and other microorganisms are secondary. In a compost pile the opposite occurs: we substitute a violent fermentation by microorganisms such as bacteria and fungi. Soil animals are secondary and come into play only after the microbes have had their hour. ”

“ It is amazing, once one has started to conserve fertility, how much one can find to add to this compost heap; I recall that one spring,77 from a well-tended compost heap and one horse stable, I had hauled on to the garden ten large, two-horse loads of fertilizer, and put the garden in excellent shape, and not only this,—it had kept the premises tidy as nothing else would have done. The gatherings of the summer and fall will, by spring, have rotted down into available form and the action of the soil, sun and rain will complete the process. ”

“ The potency of composts can vary greatly. Most municipal solid waste compost has a high carbon to nitrogen ratio and when tilled into soil temporarily provokes the opposite of a good growth response until soil animals and microorganisms consume most of the undigested paper. But if low-grade compost is used as a surface mulch on ornamentals, the results are usually quite satisfactory even if unspectacular. ”

“ Similar in that decomposition is much like any other fermentation. Different in that the home composter rarely has exactly the same materials to work with from batch to batch, does not need to control the purity and nature of the organisms that will do the actual work of humus formation, and has a broad selection of materials that can go into a batch of compost. Easier because critical and fussy people don't eat or drink compost, the soil does; soil and most plants will, within broad limits, happily tolerate wide variations in compost quality without complaint. ”

“ Textural improvements from compost depend greatly on soil type. Sandy and loamy soils naturally remain open and workable and sustain good tilth with surprisingly small amounts of organic matter. Two or three hundred pounds (dry weight) of compost per thousand square feet per year will keep coarse-textured soils in wonderful physical condition. This small amount of humus is also sufficient to encourage the development of a lush soil ecology that creates the natural health of plants. ”

“ That any dry vegetable matter, therefore, does not produce an immediate effect, ought not to induce the practical farmer to despise the application to his land—either alone, or in the form of a compost—of every thing of the kind he can readily obtain. If his fields are not already very rich in vegetable matter, both he and they are likely to be ultimately benefitted by such additions to the soil. ”

“ A compost consisting of three parts sound turfy loam, and one each of well-decayed hotbed manure and leaf-mould, and half a part of sharp silver sand, will grow all the large-flowering varieties to perfection. The soil must be used in a moderately rough condition, and the loam and manure be well mixed together. The compost should, if possible, be prepared six months beforehand, by placing the manure between the layers of loam when it is stacked up in a heap, as it comes from the pasture or common. ”

“ During the early part of this century, our focus changed to using chemicals; organic wastes were often considered nuisances with little value. These days we are rediscovering compost as an agent of soil improvement and also finding out that we must compost organic waste materials to recycle them in an ecologically sound manner. ”

“ Soil temperature has a great deal to do with how effectively compost can act as fertilizer. Sandy soils warm up much faster in spring and sand allows for a much freer movement of air, so humus decomposes much more rapidly in sand. Perhaps a sunny, sandy garden on a south-facing slope might grow pretty well with small amounts of strong compost. As a practical matter, if most people spread even the most potent compost over their gardens at only twenty-five pounds per 100 square feet, they would almost certainly be disappointed. ”

“ Visual appeal is the primary benefit of making compost in a container. To a tidy, northern European sense of order, any composting structure will be far neater than the raw beauty of a naked heap. Composting container designs may offer additional advantages but no single structure will do everything possible. With an enclosure, it may be possible to heat up a pile smaller than 1' x 4' x 4' because the walls and sometimes the top of the container may be insulating. This is a great advantage to someone with a postage stamp backyard that treasures every square foot. ”

“ Like home-brewed beer and home-baked bread you can be certain that your compost may be the equal of or superior to almost any commercially made product and certainly will be better fertilizer than the high carbon result of municipal solid waste composting. ”

“ Composts.—The compost, involving the handling of manure and soil, has no rightful place on the average farm. The gardener or trucker using great quantities of manure per acre must let some of the fermentation occur before he incorporates it with the soil, or harm will result. ”

“ When the leaves again touch prick them out in two-inch pots of leaf-mould, placing a piece of crockery over the drainage hole and filling with earth to within half an inch of the top. Plunge the pots into a box of sand in a sunny window until large enough to go out of doors. As soon as the roots fill the pots shift to a size larger, using compost of two parts fibrous loam, four parts leaf-mould, one part old, well-rotted manure, and one part sharp white sand, all thoroughly sifted together. This is called fine compost, while soils that have not been sifted are known as rough compost. ”

“ The second mass inoculation at two weeks, with material from a month-old heap provided a large supply of the type of organisms required when the heap began cooling. City gardeners without access to fresh manure may compensate for this lack by imitating Howard's mass inoculation technique, starting smaller amounts of compost in a series of bins and mixing into each bin a bit of material from the one further along at each turning. The passive backyard composting container automatically duplicates this advantage. ”

“ A difference of opinion exists as to the treatment of the compost. Some hold it indifferent whether the peat and manure are mixed, or put in layers when the composting begins. Others assert, that the fermentation proceeds better when the ingredients are stratified. Some direct, that the compost should not be stirred. The general testimony is, that mixture, at the outset, is as effectual [Pg 66] as putting up in layers; but, if the manure be strawy, it is, of course, difficult or impracticable to mix at first. Opinion also preponderates in favor of stirring, during or after the fermentation. ”

“ It is much easier to maintain a high core temperature when the weather is warm. It may not be so easy to make hot compost heaps during a northern winter. So in some parts of the country I would not expect too much from a compost pile made from autumn cleanup. This stack of leaves and frost-bitten garden plants may have to await the spring thaw, then to be mixed with potent spring grass clippings and other nitrogenous materials in order to heat up and complete the composting process. ”

“ Fertilized with sacked steer manure or mulched with average-to-poor compost, most ornamentals will grow adequately.
But vegetables are delicate, pampered critters that must grow as rapidly as they can grow if they are to be succulent, tasty, and yield heavily. Most of them demand very high levels of available nutrients as well as soft, friable soil containing reasonable levels of organic matter. So it is extremely important that a vegetable gardener understand the inevitable disruption occurring when organic matter that has a C/N is much above 12:1 is tilled into soil. ”

“ Soil is an often overlooked but critically important part of the compost pile. Least of its numerous benefits, soil contains infinitudes of microorganisms that help start out decomposition. Many compostable materials come with bits of soil already attached and few are sterile in themselves. But extra soil ensures that there will initially be a sufficient number and variety of these valuable organisms. Soil also contains insoluble minerals that are made soluble by biological activity. ”

“ In localities where compost is scarce, it is well to alternate fertilization by plowing under lupins, beans or other vegetable matter of easy growth. If the dressing of the soil is done biennially, one half of the ground could be plowed under as stated. ”

“ The compost is made by laying on the floor ten or twelve inches of muck, and on that a few inches of manure, then another heavy layer of muck, and another of manure, continuing in this manner until the heap is raised to the required height, always having a thick layer of muck at the top. ”

“ Conserving the manure and composting the crop waste allowed him to increase the soil's organic matter which increased the soil's release of nutrients from rock particles that further increased the production of biomass which allowed him to make even more compost and so on. What I have just described is not surprising, it is merely a variation on good farming that some humans have known about for millennia. ”

“ The easiest and most sure-fire improver of compost quality is time. Making a heap with predominantly low C/N materials inevitably results in potent compost if nitrate loss is kept to a minimum. But the C/N of almost any compost heap, even one starting with a high C/N will eventually lower itself. The key word here is eventually. The most dramatic decomposition occurs during the first few turns when the heap is hot. Many people, including writers of garden books, mistakenly think that the composting ends when the pile cools and the material no longer resembles what made up the heap. ”