Once we had moved into our new house, I couldn’t bear to throw away any vegetable peelings etc., so I automatically started a compost bowl in the kitchen. As it was summer and keeping an open bowl in the kitchen indefinitely wasn’t going to be a good idea, I quickly had to sort out somewhere to put compost in the garden. I kept checking the local ‘Freecycle’ group and eBay in the hope someone would have a compost bin they no longer wanted – but initially had no luck. I looked at compost bins for sale in local hardware shops, but they weren’t what I wanted and were also rather pricy.

I decided to try something new (and cheaper) by buying a plastic rubbish bin, with a tight fitting lid,  then drilled several holes in the bottom and around the lower edges, and I had a new homemade compost bin! I really had no idea what I was doing – I’d looked up some ideas on-line and seen differing ideas and opinions on whether holes were required. I decided it was worth a go.

I don’t know whether it was because the weather is wetter in England than Australia, or because of the nature and shape of the bin, but to start with my compost was very wet and cloggy and formed ‘lumps’; it was nothing like the texture I had in Australia. Perhaps, not having the wider bottom design (as on most commercial compost bins) may have caused the problem.

If you would like to discover what I put in my compost bins, have a look at twitter #thingsIputinmycompost

Junior Rambles enjoys checking and turning the compost. I am so glad that he seems as interested and fascinated as I am at how our ‘waste’ turns into new soil for the garden.

I love the idea of of reducing the waste I put in the rubbish bin by putting kitchen scaps into a compost bin instead, but I have tried and failed many times with compost over the years. Open piles or sealed bins just didn’t break down their contents, but they were successful in being smelly. I tried again about three years ago when I found a discarded compost bin in the hedge of our property. I read up on the internet and borrowed library books to search for advice. I tried a layering technique, mixing dry carbon (leaves, twigs etc.) with grass cuttings/kitchen scraps. It was my first success, but it was over a year before the contents had broken down enough to vaguely resemble ‘compost’. Even then I was finding bits that hadn’t broken down; corn cobs, avacado skins, etc.

Last year I noticed my council were offering a free composting course that I could go on, called The Art of Composting and Worms. I have to admit I was slightly skeptical, not sure how much I was likely to learn on a free council course, but thought I had nothing to lose so decided to sign up and go along. 

I was wrong. I learnt a lot. Of course, I couldn’t see the ‘scraps’ breaking down into compost during the course, I only had their word for it that if I followed the techiniques I had been taught it would work. Less than a year later I have managed to produce several bins worth of kitchen scraps and garden waste into compost! It takes me a matter of weeks now, instead of months/years!

I will keep you in suspense for now, but I promise to write soon about what I learnt and how I do it!