Long Island Gardening Community Resource

In our house, we are lucky enough to have a kitchen that has a window directly over the sink that heads to the backyard. So we just toss all out kitchen scraps right out the window directly into the compost pile.

If you make your own compost, you know its always fun to get rid of the kitchen scraps.

There are so many ways to get all those leftover banana peels turned into the nutrient rich compost that adds value to the soil. For starters, keep your grass clippings (im talking to those of you who do not add any pesticides or herbacides to their lawn) and throw them into the compost pile or toss them on top of some newspaper around your plants to use as a mulch.

Build your compost pile with all the organic material you can find. But there are a few things to note about making compost.

1. If you add seeds to your compost you will get surprises! I can vauge that too many squash seeds in the compost heap will most certainly sprout many MANY squash seeds the next year. We let it grow and boy did it flourish, and with many varieties of squash, some hybrids it seemed.

2. No bones, or animal flesh. I dont know why, but I dont do it.

3. Try and get a balance of green material (grass clippings) , brown material (mulched leaves and tree bark) , and kitchen scraps.

4. The amount of compost you get 6 months down the line of so will be a third or so of the size it started as, but it will be so full of nutrients for the upcoming crops and full of beneficial soil micro-organisms.

5. Keep your compost moist to ensure there is enough heat to maintain optimal conditions for matrial breakdown.

6. Dig around somewhere moist and fertile and get some earthworms. Introduce them to the compost pile and they will reproduce and work their magic as only earthworms can do.

7. Don’t add citrus peels to the compost. Im guessing its because they are too acidic. But I throw them under the pne trees (which love acidity) and hope they are doing good over there.

This article about compost will be updated periodically as helpful information becomes available.