How to Make Compost

It is very easy to make a compost pile. My nephew who is in the 5th grade learns about this in school and even has a project for one of his classes. I actually got this information directly from his notes.

It is not actually you who will make the compost. It is the microbes—the bacteria, fungi and other living organisms that break down organic matter to compost. The only thing that you need to do is to make sure that you provide these living organisms the things that they need so that they can make the compost. Just like most living things, 3 things that microbes need are food, water and air.

The foods that the microbes eat are the organic wastes from the kitchen or from the yard. You can put left-over food or part of meat that you didn’t eat like chicken bones. You can also put the peelings of fruits and vegetables. From your yard, you can put the trimmings from your lawn or fallen leaves.

The microbes need moisture. Normally, the wastes from the kitchen are good sources of water for them. But if you don’t put kitchen wastes and only used dry leaves, the microbes may not be able to work and make the compost. You can water the compost pile if you don’t use wet kitchen wastes there.

It is also very important to give enough air to the microbes. You can do this simply by thoroughly mixing all the ingredients and organic matter that you put in the pile. The microbes that make the compost are aerobic which means that they need air for them to continue with their work.

Making compost is only a matter of taking care of the needs of the microbes that will turn the organic waste into compost. They need food, water and air. You provide them with these and they will work to give you the compost that you can use as natural fertilizer to you vegetable or fruit garden.

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