Faster Compost – Speed Up Your Composter

Most every gardener knows some of the benefits of compost, but often they have a hard time making enough for their use.  Here are some tips to getting your garden composter working faster.

For most gardeners we want to have more compost than is available. Compost does good things for your garden in more than one way. Compost improves the structure of the soil, allowing it do drain better even while it retains water better.  It buffers the pH of the soil, reducing that acidity of soils that are too acid, and reducing the alkalinity of alkaline soil.   Sifted compost is a good seed starting medium, great for those small seeds like carrots.

While the exact ratio of high carbon to high nitrogen materials doesn’t have to be exact, it does help to make sure that we don’t have too much of one or the other.  Using just lawn clippings alone or just fall leaves is too much of one thing. Try about an even mix of brown and green materials for you composter, and it should heat up without overheating and smelling.

Breaking down the physical size of the pieces of compost material for your pile will help speed it up. This reduces the amount the material needs to be broken down, and improves the effectiveness by exposing the insides of the material. Chop down the size of the larger pieces with a pruner, or even use a lawn mower for larger amounts. You may want to buy a electric leaf shredder to do a thorough job.

A batch approach works best for fast compost.  Once you have a pile working, start another pile or keep your kitchen waste in a compost crock or pail.  You may want to have a smaller bin on the patio, and transfer the contents to a larger working bin in the yard for the fast composting.

The more often you can turn the pile, the more active it will be and the faster the compost will break down.  This has the dual advantage of bringing fresh composted material into the hotter center of the pile, while improving the air flow throughout the pile as well, refreshing the oxygen supply to the microbial activity in the hot middle of the pile.

The ideal moisture level is a pile that is like a damp cloth. It shouldn’t get too much water, as that can lead to slime and smell, and too little water will lead to nothing happening.  This can mean that sometimes you won’t be adding water, but shielding the pile from drenching rains.  Give these steps a try and see if you don’t start getting compost much more quickly in your compost pile.