Composting ... can someone educate me please!

[Millie1]

I guess my first question is, do compost and rats go hand in hand? I'm going to get a compost bin (more on that in a moment!) for chicken droppings, bedding etc and don't intend composting food leftovers or anything like that. So, will rats be attracted to chicken poop (maybe I ought to post this in the chicken topic but reckon I'll get good advice from gardeners . Re Compost bins - is it best to buy one with or without a base? Or is there a choice? Anything else I should know? Thanks!

Millie1, you can also chuck your grass clippings in the run for the chickens to rootle around it, ours love it.

Seashore - thanks, but they are not actual real railway sleepers. They are modern wood made to look like railway sleepers so I think I would be ok.

I love composting as well!! We have had a bin for 3 years now and I did the ritual yearly task of emptying the bin and getting the lovely compost out for my pots and tomato seeds. My Dh bought some from a local seller door to door for £2.50 for a bag and I was miffed as I go three times as much for free! I have miked the two together for now and it looks fab!

We can bu it locally for £5 if you take your own bags and shovel - it is the recycled stuff form the council collections. Every so often it is free.

I was trying to explain to the kids about how the stuff breaks down and becomes 'soil' 0 it is like magic!!

katymac as an ex farmer I am like your gardener. Farmers do manure, not compost. I therefore dont have a compost heap but am willing to be persuaded.

As I have a major rat problem so I generally shred all woody clippings straight on to the garden with a garden shredder to suppress weeds. I dig chicken manure straight into the veg patch and bury it so it does not attract rats. I have a mower that returns the grass clippings sraight back ot the lawn as continuously taking clippings of a lawn depletes it. Any weeds I pull up I put in with the chickens to eat. I recycycle newspaper, card etc. The very few things I throw away from the garden such as moss off the lawn that has been treated with chemicals I put in a composter bin for the council.

My view is that composting is not necessary with good management. Even without chickens, it is surely better to shred and bury garden waste as a sort of green manure or alternatively, burn garden waste and spread the ash as fertiliser?

Am I missing something about compost?

Beenbeta - if you have a smallish garden and no chickens then you can't bury all the garden waste and food waste. I takes ages to rot down in the soil and it is actually bad for the soil while it is breaking down as it ...does summat I can't remember ... leeches stuff out and makes it too acidic and uses oxygen (I think)... Whereas the heap keeps everything in a compact space and acts as a sort of reactor making the contents rot down way, way, way faster than they would alone or dug in and actually makes decent compost that you can choose where to apply. So yes - there is a great benefit to a heap.

I thought it was somethign to do with nitrogen- something like - although I'm willing to be put right by someone that knows it for sure - if soemthing's rotting down it needs nitrogen to help - thus meaning that your plants don't have it as an option - and being in a relatively small amount, it takes longer to decompose and therefore the nitrogen is tied up and the new nitrogen isn't released for a relatively long time. In contrast, you do the rotting in the compost heap - so any loss of nitrogen doesn't affect your plants - and due to the quantities a) it goes quicker and b) it heats up so that weed seeds are killed so when you put it on your garden, its all positive for the plants.

And, btw, I don't dig my veg garden anymore - having got it established (raised bed) I now can just put the compost on the top or as I plant plants and the worms do the rest. No more double digging for me!!! (You have to be careful not to tread on the soil for this to work though)

that's right mistlethrush - things that are rotting hog nitrogen for the time being. supposed to inhibit seed sprouting, etc.

I'm in Oz and struggling a bit to get my compost right, as the summer is so miserably hot, then we had lots of rain, it's lovely now. But I did have a rat (in broad daylight too, cheeky thing!) and the council here said I needed to lime the heap. Am probably now over-liming, but poison and most traps are not an option with v small dc's about.

Right, I see.

I did have in the back of my mind that ploughing straw into farmland reduces nitrogen content so it has to be burried deep. Ploughing in things like grassland with clover in clover inceases nitrogen though.

I guess my special situation is a biggish garden with chickens I have not come up aganist the problem quite so much as I would in a small garden.

I did see Monty Don turning his compost heap a few years ago and he had some quite woody branches in it (which I also have from time to time) and I did think to myself they would not rot down.

Maybe I need to rethink composting.

BB - clover and other similar things are actually nitrogen fixers - they have modules on their roots that help to trap the nitrogen - and when you turn these in, you release that nitrogen - which is why this sort of thing is rather good as a green mulch.

mistlethrush - I've got a raised bed (this is the second year) and it's completely empty at the moment apart from having new compost on. Do you think I can just plant and add compost like you say from now on? How established is established?

Mine's now about 5 yrs old. However, mine was filled with soil from the garden which I put in in cubes. Literally. Clay soil - I cut out a spade width square to a spade depth and then stacked that upside down in the raised bed. So the first year I did need to dig - added lots of lime, compost etc. 2nd year AWFUL weeds - again, had to dig. After that, not been a problem with just surface dressing. However, if it hadn't been such heavy soil to start with, might have got away with no dig sooner.

Its really important to avoid compaction if you want to go no dig though - mine is quite wide so that I have a scafold plank I lay on the soil to walk along to get to the middle (or put it on either edge and balance) - particularly when the soil is moist you really don't want to walk on it, otherwise no-dig won't work as well for you.

However, I have absolutely no regrets about using the clay because it does hold the water well - so I don't have to water as much as I might with a lighter soil in a raised bed - I couldn't plant in the ground as the plants would have floated away, but in the raised bed its perfect!

That is really interesting about the clay soil and raised beds. My gardeners have built me lovely 2 foot hight massive planters for the veg I am going to plant. And they have half filled them with the clay soil/turf that they have been digging up from the rest of the garden and will then fill the rest (about the top half) with good bought soil. They have assured me that this is fine/good way of doing it. I did have my doubts. Sounds like it will be ok though.

Yes, mine looked REALLY awful to start with - it was a bit like a horizontal dry stone wall... But I just use a hand fork now for any weeding necessary (not much not thankfully) and planting and in general its beautifully friable but retains water well...

mistlethrush- thanks. Ours is a tiny 1m by 1m raised bed and I think the soil is quite nice (non-gardener-speak). Not compacted or clayish. Just some weeds, not even a lot. No excuses then ... Self-sufficiency here we come! ( and at prospect of self-sufficiency on 1m by 1m plot.)

Wow .... what a tonne of reading! This is great.

Mistlethrush ... we have raised veggie beds too - they were built last year and were filled with clay soil. I've dug it over about 3 times this year and added manure and compost (sadly not my own - yet!) before planting. I know what you mean about the plank to balance on - it's absolutely essential. it doesn't take much to compact it. Great to hear that the digging will lessen each year. I was thinking about sewing a green manure over this winter and then digging that in in January or so. Think I've read that somewhere but shall need to go back to my veggie books!

BTW, phoned local council and they sell 330 litre bins for £5!! Great!

Millie - you might want to consider lime too - my father was an agricultural consultant and recommended it - and I think that it probably really helped... Lime's quite beneficial for veg too....

Does anyone know if I can put hamster bed/droppings in the compost bin?

I THINK droppings from vege eaters (rabbits, hamsters etc) are fine to add. Not altogether sure, but think so.

has anyone used a composphere ? They look fantastic, but very expensive.

thanks for replying,
I've never seen a composhere before, but they look fun! LOL my dc would love that!

Yes droppings from vegetarian animals are super for compost heaps.

That compospere looks fab! Bit heavy when full though?