Tag: compost

The big composting special

Hooray it’s that time of year again when I regale you with advice on the merits of composting. For weeks I have been excited about this but unfortunately I mentioned my excitement to Cruella (my wife). Since then she has mercilessly mocked me saying that compost is smelly and that I am an idiot for getting excited about dirt. To make matters worse her chickens have taken to following me around pretending to hold their beaks and shouting smelly in chickenese (at least I think that’s what they are shouting.

But I’ve got my own back. Remember that Coca Cola advert that appears on the television every Christmas, where a large truck with a picture of Santa Claus on the side goes through towns accompanied by the sound track singing “holidays are coming…holidays are coming”. Well that has been me for the past few weeks I have been singing “compost special is coming…compost special is coming”. To say this has annoyed Cruella (my wife) would be an understatement, so much so that I now mumble it under my breath, and when she says what did you just say, I reply “nothing”. I know it’s not much, but I count that as a small victory.

Anyway, on with the show let’s keep the excitement bubbling.

1st November 2025. Things I have been doing lately:

  • Why compost
  • How to compost
  • What to compost
  • What not to compost
  • The key ingredients of compost
  • what should compost look like

Why compost. All garden soil gets depleted over time and lose micro nutrients either they just get washed away by the rain or the plants take them up and the soil needs replenishing. Composting can help improve soil by adding back these nutrients and encouraging helpful bacteria that will break down and improve your soil. When added to your garden compost will help suppress weeds, lessen the need for chemical fertilisers, retain moisture and give you a warm feeling that you are doing a “green thing”. So no matter what your motivation, by composting you will be improving your garden and it will make you a better person.

How to compost. You don’t have to make a big deal out of composting and any one can do it. Whether you have a large garden or just a little patio garden with pots, adding compost will improve your garden. The basic need is to have a compost bin, or compost heap where you can store your compost. This can be very basic such as a little patch of your garden where you tip excess produce and cuttings etc. You could just have a heap in the corner covered by an old carpet, or if you like make a basic container out of chicken wire.  It might be easier just to buy a compost bin from a store and there are thousands of them, from basic one simple bin, right up to multi-bin purpose built composting systems.

As you would expect, I have a purpose built composting system consisting of two large bins with lid for easy access and doors that can be raised to allow me to get at the compost from the bottom. The photo below shows my composting system.

Now, I don’t want you getting compost bin envy, that’s not the idea. I designed these and had them built when we first moved to this house because this size garden calls for this amount of compost. There are fruit trees to be mulched, lots of beds that need seasonal replenishing, lawns that need some topping and all the planting and stuff on the potting bench.

What to compost. Now you can compost most organic material. Examples would be:

  • all plant cuttings and mown grass
  • vegetable trimmings etc from your kitchen
  • old newspapers and cardboard
  • hair and fur from your dog, cat, hamster; even chicken feathers
  • twigs and branches up to about an inch thick
  • eggshells, coffee grounds and filters, tea bags
  • fruit, but not too many lemons or oranges as they will make the heap acidic

What not to compost. You must be careful not to compost the following:

  • cooked food of any sort (this will encourage rats and cockroaches). This includes: meat, bones, fish, fat or dairy
  • leaves or cuttings from plants that have been infected with disease or pathogens such as rust on Roses or mildew. If you compost these then you will infect the heap.
  • dog or cat poo; and don’t even think of human poo.

The key ingredients of compost. Quite simply good composting requires four things:

1. Green items: that add nitrogen (grass, leaves etc)

2. Brown items: that add carbon (twigs, branches, newspapers etc)

3. Water: to keep the heap moist but not wet (don’t let it dry out, but don’t over soak it)

4. Air: oxygen is needed to encourage the composting process, so once a month you need to stir your compost with a fork or spade to keep the air circulating.

There is one other vital ingredient that you can choose to add to your compost heap, and that is “compost accelerator”. This is normally added as a powder which encourages the development of microbes in your compost heap and speeds up the composting process.

The photo below shows all the key ingredients apart from air; but I assure you it is there. In the photo you will also see a special compost turning tool that I bought some 20 years ago. You just push this into your compost heap then the two little wings at the bottom of the rod come out as you pull up and the whole heap is lifted and turned. If you can find one, buy it.

What should  compost look like? A question I am always asked (I lead an interesting life). The photos below show the current state of my compost bins. The first photo is the bin currently in use, and you can see all the ingredients I talked about above. The second photo shows the resting bin this has been in use for a few weeks that and has already had lots of compost removed. You can see from this photo that the bin is half empty, and this is because all the insects and beneficial microbes will have eaten stuff whilst making the compost. The final photo shows the finished compost; or as I call it black gold. Each of these bins will on average give me 20 wheel barrow loads of compost each year.

Gettting in the compost bin. One of the great joys at the end of a hard days gardening of trimming and cutting is to get in the compost bin and tread it all down. What do you mean you’ve never done this, just me then. One of the drawbacks of getting in the bin and stomping your compost down is that quite often you have cockroaches run up your legs which can be disquieting. To overcome this I have cut a board exactly the size of my bin which I fit into the top and then jump up and down on (patent applied for).

The photos below show my bin with the board in place, followed by a view of a reduced bin. Finally, I had to take a selfie of me in the bin as Cruella (my wife) refused to,come near because of cockroaches. Just after she took this photo, Cruella slammed the lid down and I was in there for two days. I must say they were the happiest two days of my life. She only got me out because the dishwasher needed emptying.

Gathering seeds, composting leaves, cleaning up and the chickens go to the Ball

Now that is what you call a title, no messing around or euphemisms, you know exactly what you are getting in this blog post. It is the last real post before we begin the big winter cutback, so there is still lots to do. Added to this I have had the problem of Cruella (my wife) preparing the chickens for a Ball. Anyway on with the gardening.

12th December 2024. Things I have been doing lately:

  • Gathering seeds
  • Composting leaves
  • Last minute clean up jobs you need to do
  • Planting out cuttings
  • Cruella prepares the chickens for a Ball

Gathering seeds. Take a look around your garden at this time of year and you will find lots of seed heads and pods ripe for picking. If you pick them off now, store them to dry, and plant them next Spring, then you will have lots of lovely new plants for free. But what’s more you will be on your way to being a gardener rather than a shopper for plants.

You will have lots of different seed heads in your garden of all different types, just waiting for you to harvest them. To process the seeds is very simple.

  • Wait until your seed heads have completed their cycle, the flowers have died and fallen off and the seed pod that is left has gone fully dry and brown.
  • Cut the seed head off with your secateurs and if possible leave a little bit of stem.
  • Place the seed heads into a plain white envelopes, one for each type of seed, until you are ready to process them.
  • Depending on the type of seed pod, the process is more or less the same; carefully remove all the outer casing of the seed pod till you expose the seed. Pour this into the palm of your hand.
  • Gently blow across the seeds as you transfer them between your palms, this just removes any chaff.
  • Place the seeds in plain white envelopes by type with the name and year clearly written on the envelope and store them in a cool dark place (a drawer is fine).

The process is shown for Marigolds and Trumpet Vine in the photos below. Click on each photo for a larger view.

Marigolds
Trumpet Vine
Ripe seed heads
Cruella took the photos I look younger in real life
Roll seedhead between your fingers
Gently blow away the chaff
Just split trumpet vine seed pods
Let the seeds flow into your hand
My seeds ready to be stored away safely for Spring planting

Composting leaves. Most gardens have a tree or two, and as we all know deciduous trees shed their leaves every Autumn. Now you can either see these fallen leaves as a mess that needs to be cleaned up, or, you can see the leaves as compost gold.

I have lots of pine trees, but their leaves whilst perfectly compostable over time, tend to produce an acid compost. So if you have lots of pine trees it is ok to add pine needles to your compost bin, but no more than 10% of each layer. However, if you have a deciduous tree, like my large Mulberry or even better a Fig with its large leaves then you are lucky. The photo below shows my Mulberry and one of my figs shedding their leaves. Click on each photo for a larger view.

You don’t have to wait till all the leaves are off your trees. Instead get into the habit of clearing the leaves once every two weeks. Just rake the leaves up into piles and then store them in plastic garden sacks. See photos below.

Leaves compost in a different way to normal compost, so don’t just add them to your compost bin. Store them in plastic sacks, but before you store them prick the sack with a fork in a number of places to allow for air circulation. You will need to store your sacks somewhere in your garden where they won’t be unsightly and where they do not get sun. See photos.

Your leaf compost will be ready in about a year, roughly the same time as you will be harvesting the next lot. You can cheat if you want. After about six months just pour the sack into your normal compost. It won’t be fully composted, but when you get to my age you go for quick wins.

Last minute clean up jobs you need to do. There is still a few little jobs you need to do before next month’s big cut back.

You can start by cleaning up fallen citrus fruit such as oranges and lemons. The recent high winds here in the Costa Blanca has meant we have lots of fallen fruit. If you leave this fruit on the ground for any length of time then you will get an active green mould growing on it. Left to itself this will release spores which are not very healthy for other plants or us. My efforts to stop a future plague are shown below. Click on each photo for a larger view.

If you have Fig trees that still have residual fruit, just take them off. Any fruit left on your trees will never mature and will only take strength away from the tree. With figs the sap will not yet have been drawn back into the roots so be careful you don’t get a sap burn.

Take all the fruits off
Look carefully and you can see the caustic sap seeping out.

Planting out cuttings. If you have any cuttings you have grown out, then now is a good time to get them in the ground. There is still warmth and moisture in the ground so it will not be a great shock.

I have grown a number of cuttings over the Spring and Summer. During the Summer I mostly just dot these around the garden in pots, just to see how they get on. By now I will have either put them into larger pots or if they have really performed then they go into the ground.

I have a problem area in one of my hedges where a Jasmine cutting is being very slow to grow to fill the gap left by a dead Hibiscus. The photo below shows the problem. From the photo you can see that there is Plumbago to its left and Pink Trumpet Vine to its right. The idea was that the Jasmine would grow and provide colour variety between these two.

In order to deal with this problem I have been growing a Trumpet Vine to add to my hedge. I like to keep hedges over planted and competing for space and light thereby guaranteeing more flowers. The Trumpet Vine has grown strongly during the Summer and now needs to go into the ground. The Jasmine has had its chance, now for some competition. The photo below shows the new gap filling contender.

I have trimmed it back ready for its transplantation. On a sad note, my lovely teapot confection on the pillar was blown over and smashed in the recent storm; Cruella is devastated.

When planting out make sure you do all the usual stuff like clear the area of any weeds or stones then dig a planting hole big enough not to cramp the roots. When you take the plant out of its pot make sure to tease out the roots so that they can be encouraged to reach into their new soil. Also, if possible sprinkle some Mycorrizhal rooting powder into the planting hole and onto the roots as this will definitely aid early root growth. The photos below show the process. Click on each photo for a larger view.

Cruella prepares her chickens for a Ball. It all started when Cruella (my wife) read a magazine article about Queen Charlottes Ball where debutantes are presented and come out into society. She breathlessly told me that this was just the sort of opportunity her girls needed, and if they could only come out formally she would be the happiest mother alive – I have given up explaining that she is not their mother.

Despite my explaining that Queen Charlotte’s Ball was not for chickens, she refused to accept this and began looking up Finishing Schools in Switzerland. I only averted her flying to Switzerland by persuading her that it would be far better if she prepared the girls for “finishing” at home.

It has been almost a month now and every day has been filled with Cruella schooling her girls in all sorts of arcane skills and manners. They start most mornings with “dining etiquette”, this involves politely pecking at their food, not pecking each other and definitely no eating worms. This is followed by “elocution”, to be honest as it is all in chickenese, I have no real idea what they are saying. They all cluck away as Cruella nods enthusiastically, but it does sound a bit like “how now brown cow” but in chickenese.

The afternoons are spent in “deportment, dance and formal bowing”. It is quite fascinating, especially if you have never seen a chicken walk up and down with a book on its head. Dance is my favourite as Cruella stands in the middle of the lawn playing Mozart on her phone whilst shouting out the timings. Despite her best efforts the chickens gyrate wildly in a figure of eight in front of her and all end up colliding and fighting.

I am involved in the formal bowing part. I have to sit on a chair pretending to be the King whilst Cruella acting as a Herald formally calls each of her girls forward and introduces them to me. Each bird has a new sash in soft pink silk and they formally approach me and bow. From my perspective though the whole effect is ruined by them poohing on my shoes. The photo below shows a dancing lesson in action.

The music was Mozart – Ascanio in Alba, the dancing was appalling