What to Do When You Have Run Out of Compost? Plus How to Composting tips!
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- Опубликовано: 8 сен 2024
- I this video I explain what we do when we run out of our own homemade compost. I also show our composting bay system made from pallets and describe how to use this method to make the best compost.
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Self Sufficient Me is based on our small 3-acre property/homestead in SE Queensland Australia about 45kms north of Brisbane - the climate is subtropical (similar to Florida). I started Self Sufficient Me in 2011 as a blog website project where I document and write about backyard food growing, self-sufficiency, and urban farming in general. I love sharing my foodie and DIY adventures online so come along with me and let's get into it! Cheers, Mark :)
I work at one of the local high schools and went to the home ec (cooking) department and asked what they did with all their food scraps. I was told that they throw them all in the bin at the end of the day but they would leave them bagged up each day for me to collect if i wanted. I then went and hit up the canteen as well. My compost is now booming on what would have just ended up as landfill. Better for the environment and better for my gardens ;)
What a fantastic idea and another great example of people thinking outside of the box to make a real practical difference in their community! Thank you for sharing :)
Many coffee shops are willing to hold the coffee grounds for gardeners. The combination of grounds and filters are a great addition to compost.
Great idea.
I'm surprised all schools don't do this.
Love your 'Dad' style acting skills. hehe
hes like the hippie brother of russel crowe
😀
@@darkmistico I'm convinced 007 is based on him
I have the feeling this is NOT acting...
😉😁😂
0:30 Someone, award this man an Oscar!
Reckon you were made to do these videos mate! Better than TV garden shows that's for damn sure 👍
Hello Mark,
You are a modern day hero.
I have never commented on a person's website until now...
But you have us so fired up to grow Healthy plants as food and medicine.
I wish I could meet you and salute you in person
Thank you for your contributions to a better Earth.
Cheers,
Patrick
from Colorado
This is my favorite RUclips channel on gardening. You put a lot of heart and soul into your videos and explain everything in a way that is very organized yet entertaining. I need all the details you explain here because I’m completely new to it. Thank you for being the Steve Irwin of plants.
I know this is a particularly older video, but I do hope you see this. I am truly thankful for all your content. I’m on the other side of the world 🇨🇦 but everything you are teaching me as I grow y raised garden beds is so appreciated. Thank you for all your shared knowledge. This week I’m off to pinch some pallets from my local stores, and can’t wait to grow my own amendments... be well...and keep blessing us all ♥️
Last year on my watermelon bed, I planted winter rye grass, let it get6 inches tall. Mowed it and made sure all clippings were blow onto the bed.
I spread a 12 x 50 3 mil clear plastic and laid scrap wood around the edges for one month, them pulled up the plastic and planted watermelons. Worked great!
This year same bed, I planted wheat. I plan to let it get 1 - 2 feet tall the run over it with a garden tractor pulling a roller to crimp the stalks, killing them and laying them down flat forming a thick mulch layer.
We'll see how it works!
My original plan was to get some round hay bales and try the Ruth Stout method, but the pandemic got in the way of getting hay.
Benn watching your videos for a while from here in Southern California where I live. I enjoy them so much, not only for the knowledge you pass on, but because you come across as such a genuine and kind-hearted individual. It is your personality as mush as your gardening knowledge that makes your RUclips channel so enjoyable. Thank you. God bless you and your family.
Thank you very much for those kind words and God Bless you also :)
Mark, never subscribed to anything ever. You sir are so bloody interesting, funny and know what the hell your talking about. Thank you for your videos learning a lot ...cheerz.
Diddo. Another rare gem from Australia.
Dude, I dont get it. But you are right...
yes nice relaxed feel no annoying music everywhere just the facts.
A commentor on a permaculture video wrote that her old granny always had the kids bury food scraps and ashes from the cook stove in the garden that was in use...they buried it around or in between rows. I suppose this is similar in a keyhole garden layout where you compost in the center and the nutrients leech out around to growing beds. They did not seem to have problems with rodents or wildlife digging up the beds because the scent was buried. But it may be a good solution for someone who doesn't want to maintain a compost system. :)
A few more ideas:
1) add biochar to the soil. It increases the water holding capacity of the soil, bacterial and fungal activity, and only needs to be added once (if you are putting in 10% by volume). If you are making your own bit by bit, add it to the holes as you put in the starts, then next year put the starts in different spots.
2) Cruise your local grocery stores for material to bulk up your compost pile. The green produce departments toss old/unsuitable vegetables on a regular basis.
3) Cruise some local restaurants for kitchen/leftover waste and start a bokashi bucket. Bokashi matures in a few weeks and can be directly used in the garden.
4) Throw your kitchen waste into a blender with some water to make a garden smoothie. Pour it around the plants or along a row. Then lightly scratch it in. It will compost in-place as it feeds the local population of microbes.
Do you enjoy waking up, looking in the mirror and seeing a paedophile?
I might try that 4th one , good ideas !
Hey Mark! I am a cook first and a gardener a distant second. Compost for me in the garden is like making your own stocks and sauces in the kitchen, you know what goes into them. Cheers!
I put cheap potting mix in my compost to add some fill and structure. It helps bulk it up when you know you'll need some soon. Also, I add the cheap manure bags you can get, doesn't hurt to grab a $3 bag of aged poo and chuck it in a week or two before you use the whole compost. Mix it in, bulk up your compost and the few weeks (or months) it's in there will turn the whole lot in to a nice mix. Plenty of poo for sale here in Toowoomba, but it takes a while to age. So I age fresh poo for a few months in a separate compost by itself, then add that in to my main compost to give it a boost.
can i suggest when u make ur compost with potting mix and blood and bone that u dump it all in the compost tumbler, mix it in there with plenty of water and turn it twice a day for 3 days. It will break down the blood and bone and pick up the microbes from inside the compost tumbler.
awesome reply... bet he does;)
I was going to ask him if making a 'micro and macro organisms bed and putting compost on it once established, you'd be moving the good guys with the soil from bed 2 to 3 and then the garden enriching the good guys he was talkin about;)
The right man for gardening 😇 your goofiness and spirit make this fun and inspiring!
Joe, from Guatemala here: I am in the process of aquiring new abilities, one of them is cultivating in my garden. Your advices and demonstrations are really interesting (I usually stay all time long at them). I am on no-dig method and have a large compost bay, but I surely will organize the three bay methods right tomorrow. Wow. Best wishes and keep publishing, friends.
Very helpful advice - the only caveat I'd express is using plastic - ie: with a tumbler, and covering the compost with it - Knowing now that plastic leeches and breaks down ending up in our soil & perhaps in the plants, also the birds & animals, I'm trying to limit use of plastic as far as is POSSIBLE around the garden. Wonderful help here, Mark, thanks 👍😎🍀🥑🍒🌷
My kids and Niece and nephew have been watching you and are using your influence to make their own garden and videos they are taking over my yard 😂 on the bright side I'm getting free labour 😂
You never fail to make me smile with the opening of every video! 🇳🇿❤️🇦🇺
I'm catching up on lots of your videos. You are a JOY to watch. We smile at every video. Thank you so much for your amazing contributions and caring about our brothers and sisters. And of course, our planet. Cheers!
I have to do my gardening in 5 gallon buckets closer to the house. Too old now to do what I used to. I've been saving kitchen waste and want to make compost ... just have to do it those buckets. I'm going to check your web site for a "how to", as I've not done bucket composting. I'm in the US, enjoy your videos and learn so much from you ... thank you!!!
Whenever I have a container of dirt that needs refreshed, I'll dump the soil into another container. Then I'll add fresh scraps on the bottom and fill back up with the old dirt. It's less of an eyesore and breaks down nicely, especially if you rinse and repeat. :)
not being able to go out due to covid 19 lockdown , i have taken to gardening and hydroponics . Your videos have changed my thought process
I love your presentations, the way you give it flare! You make me laugh and learn at the same time
Thanks Judiee! :)
Over the past two years we began composting. We started with horse manure, vegetable trimmings, lawn clippings and leaves that fell off our trees in the fall. We immediately noticed that even the compost we added to the tomato's really made a difference vs the store bought stuff. The store bought stuff had trouble blooming and setting produce, so we had to add fertilizer to get any production at all. We notice that after a year the compost was breaking down very slowly even though it was kept damp. So my wife picked up a one pound tub of red worms (often called red wigglers) and we put them in the pile. In one years time the worms exploded and are helping to make the richest compost we have ever made. In the future we plan to get several yards of cow manure and use bales of straw along with leaves from our yard. With the worms it should breakdown very fast and the worm castings will make it very rich and breaks down some of the vegetable material so that it is readily digestible for the plants. I estimate the one pound of worms quickly multiplied to about fifty pounds over the past year. I have learned alot, we also plan to use the green manure crops (often called cover crops) to further condition the beds and adding plant matter to the bed. This is another option t resting a bed. By planting a cover crop and cutting it down before it blooms and makes seed, you can fix, calcium (comfrey o buckwheat), nitrogen (legume, like clovers, face bean, hairy vetch, alfalfa, ect.) and other minerals in the beds, depending on the type of cover crop you plant. Legumes will require a grass to help as most legumes won't do well with out protection from hot sun and wind. Truth is there are alot of options to make great growing beds. If you use wood chip or wood product in your bed you will need lots of nitrogen as wood chips require nitrogen to begin breaking down.
Plenty of top first hand composting experience and tips in your post above Ed and I couldn't agree more about the worms and this is one main reason why I like to compost in bays rather than a tumbler because more worms find their way into the mix. Thank you :)
If you have a hot compost won't the worms die from the heat ? Or do you put them in after the compost has cooled ?
carol parrish with horse and most cow manure it does not get really hot. Which is a disadvantage when it comes to weed seeds showing up in your compost. When it gets above 150° f for a sustained period, the weed seeds die and will not sprout. The worms will avoid the hot areas on their own. If you add chicken or turkey manure, you will find it gets a lot hotter, so I try to spread that out in the mix or compost it separately. With just a few chickens we have only small amounts which does not affect the pile that much. Locally here we can buy turkey and cow manure by the cubic yard.
Self Sufficient Me, we made a similar compost area with pallets, we did not divide it though. We turned it over and moved the pile through as it broke down, the end from which we used the finished compost. We are going to make ours about larger as we could not produce enough for our needs. Being disabled I cannot run a rototiller and am going to convert over to the no till, permaculture beds. So I am going to have to make tons of compost. I expect this to take ma a few years. I am really enjoying your videos, good stuff!
I live in the inner suburbs and as my garden is small I make my own compost soil by blending my food scraps with water, turning it into a smoothie and thoroughly mixing it in an isolated soil bed about once a week. This not only helps to speed up the decomposition but it also prevents rodents, etc from digging it up. I also mix in wood ash from my brick BBQ in the same bed. This not only generates nitrogen but it also adds to the pile. It generally takes about 6 months to make enough compost soil to fill 3-and-a-half polystyrene boxes worth, but it's enough to fulfill my needs for at least half a year.
Every now and then, instead of adding to the bed of compost soil, I will either mix the blended compost directly into the garden or I will turn it into liquid food by adding a lot of water.
Really liked the tip about using cheap potting mix and adding blood and bone. Thank you.
I love your enthusiasm. You can spark up any City Slicker to take up a fork and spade and start turning lawn into lunch. If I run out of compost, intending to plant something soon, I make a quick compost in the following way. Collect in large bags lots of leaves, shred them into a fine mulch with my lawnmower, which has an mulching attachment. (Water leaves, or the job is too dusty. Then I keep aside a big heap of grass clippings from mowing my lawn. Then I go to a farm nearby and buy cheaply 5 -6 bags Cow Manure. Soak the manure to soften. I mix and stack these ingredients in thin layers, putting a little soil in between. Now the most important part. Mix a can of beer, 1 cup of Molasses. ( purchased cheaply from Produce or Pet supply store.) Dilute with water, Makes 8x 9L Watering cans. Sprinkle this between the layers while stacking. Don't make it too wet. This mixture helps to compost the already fine ingredients in 3 weeks. Compost is contained with 2 starposts and fine chicken wire. Instead of turning this big heap of about a cubic metre, (who has the time?) I bought a power planter with a long shaft, and the compost is turned in 5 min. Turn every week. www.powerplanter.com.au. By the way, in one of your videos you mentioned you live 45 km north of Brisbane. Well, I live 50 km north of Brisbane.
I made compost in the back yard by accident before i got into gardening. I have a date and a fig tree in the back and they drop fruit everywhere! I raked up all the over ripe fruits and placed in an old trash bin that was going to go to the trash as the opening lever was broken, and I forgot all about it. All the dates, figs and twigs i raked up became a very fine light brown compost in a few months. Almost like coffee grounds.
I enjoyed your video. I compost directly into my beds. All my kitchen, lawn and garden scraps are spread in layers and covered with a layer of garden soil, wood chips or cow manure. I grow all year round. Zone 9b central Florida U.S.A.
I grow year around, South Florida! I think 10B
Thank you, Roland. Zone 9 index 16 here. Will try. Was thinking about this.
mum wraps her kitchen scraps in newspaper and just buries them in the yard.. shes been doing that for 40 years.
@@dibrentley7915 what's nice is there are so many ways to do compost. I was reading somewhere or a video that it's best to wait approximately 6 weeks before planting where one has placed scraps as those scraps use the oxygen in the soil and will rob new roots of necessary oxygen...have you heard of this?
I grow about 5-6 months in zone 8b Tacoma, eggplant and okra do not produce anything here.
Thanks for all the information. On my way to being more self sufficient
I love your positive, enthusiastic energy. You always provide very interesting, practical advice
Thanx for another excellent video my friend. In the past I've overwinter beds by covering with a layer of horse manure or even 4-6 inches of leaves and seaweed and then covered with an old carpet , the worms and microbes will do their magic over the winter and early spring and leave you a rejuvenated bed x.
I have a Bokashi bin system. In previous rentals (and when I was living with my parents) I'd just bury it somewhere in the garden, but now I have 2 compost bins too so I've been chucking the "cooked" Bokashi into there - it breaks down in a matter of weeks. I've also been spreading a bucketful of the mix about 15cm down in my raised beds.
I have a small garden bed and I never tried to compost in piles like that. I usually dig a hole, throw my scraps in and cover it up. This worked good last year. This year I tried a small pile of compost and it was great! I stopped throwing scraps in because the plants growing from the pile are beautiful!
If you’ve got room or you have some local,grow some luceana to chop and drop it adds large bulk to the rest of your compost pile ,thanks for the tips the ole blood n bone is great in my climate,basically desert in nw qld the compost basically evaporates in summer as does the mulch the lucenaa grow quick and are tough I’m also starting to use pigeon peas with great results
When I was a kid we had a lovely garden, we used to dig a trench for all our composting, once it was full we would dig a trench the same size as the original one approximately 45cm deep and 80cm across by 3m long putting the dirt on top of the old composting trench the new trench would be dug 30 cm from the first one and this would go on through the garden till we would get back to the first position and then continue back through again and again this is the best way I have ever seen for a vegetable garden.
That's how I got my garden started, works a treat
Great idea. Will try it. Thanks.
Hi Mark. We travel a bit, within Oz, March to June, Aug to Nov, so these are the times when we're not home and our plots are rested. During that time I topdress with slow release pellets, as much organic matter as I can scrape up and then top dress with pea straw. One bed in particular had strawberries in it for about 5 yrs and the soil was really bad. Im amazed at the transformation over a short period. We're away now but Im looking forward to getting home and planting up the bed for a summer autumn harvest. Love the vid, keep up the great work. Apart from GAust, your vids aremy goto gardening info. Thanks, youre a legend.
Great video and thank you for all those tips. I would also recommend using green mulch/living mulch. This year I have covered my vegetable garden with a thick cover of mustard that I will chop up and dig in prior to planting my tomatoes. Living mulch has the same advantages as normal mulch, but is also useful to break up compact soils through root growth and keep nitrogen from leeching out of your soil under rainfall.
I find it handy to confiscate my neighbors' yard waste on the roadside before the municipality picks it up. This way I have plenty of organic material to add to my compost and keep it coming.
I've mowed my neighbor's yard before so I could bag the clippings. LOL
He tried to pay me......
Steven , my neighbors just gather and burn it!
Unfortunately, my neighbor uses chemicals on his lawn. Bummer. I did grab bags of leaves from the corner in the fall, and that neighbor didn't use any chemicals. I lack grass clippings right now.
That's great! I grab the bagged leaves in the fall from up and down the street.
I convinced my neighbour to dump his grass clippings directly into my compost bin. I don't have to do a thing : 😃
Another great video. I'm new at gardening and my first (so called) garden turned into a weed jungle ! NOW, i'm getting serious. I am building raised beds and will begin them with the method in your video (Hugelkultur ?). Fall is coming fast here in Missouri (USA) so I am actually getting ready for next Spring. I have found that your videos are THE VERY BEST on the internet. Thank You for taking the time for these videos because it really helps people like me. WHO KNEW there was so much to know about gardening? Now, I know how very much that I do not know. Thanks Again.
I'd make compost tea out of the little scoop left of compost ... that way it's spread more liberally
Another great tip! :)
Great idea
Yes but it doesnt improve the soil organic matter
Cassie Oz sure it does.. fresh compost tea,if done properly, has chunks of compost in it which has hefty amounts of organic matterS
Cassie Oz your welcome
I also recommend getting some pet rabbits. I just scoop the manure out and use it as soil in itself. It isnt a hot manure so it doesnt need to rest at all. Ive grown amazing crops in nothing but a container and bunny berries!
HAHAHA! I absolutely love your videos! I found your channel because my wife wants to get into gardening. You do a great job, sir! Keep up the great work!
you are touching on my lack of compost (working now only two months old) hoping by the coming spring we have WONDERFUL soil topper to fill our new
galvanized raised beds! We also have a tumbler that we started with last year..I do like it but not enough for what we have planned..we raised sweet potatoes in straw bales WONDERFUL and at the end of the season when we harvested the potatoes from the straw it had decomposed beautifully adding a rich wonderful medium to the soil where we harvested..you have touched on many options and thank you for all of the information..feel like we are getting there!
i love how much energy you put into your videos, i love how much information you give. you are one awesome human being
O have found out over the years to have at least 10 compost piles i dont turn them i just use the oldest on and keep building new ones this is perfect and you can move it around the garden with a lot less hauling but that just the best and easiest way i have found happy gardening
Great info. I defiantly agree with the slower home made compost being the better. It’s a slow long patient process to just keep feeding the process and working on it.
Caught an Aussie stealing my compost. I had him at gunpoint:"Tell me! Did you come here to die?" "Nah mate, I came 'ere yesterday..."
I don't know how the Aussie accent sounds in your head to make that joke work, but it's wrong. Haha. Nice try though.
I laughed, thanks
Anton, lol literally! Thank you for the laughs
Nearly had your own blood and bone
This happened to a Korean when he visited Australia and encountered the Aussie accent for the first time
So many, many hidden gems of information in your videos!! So much experience, well-communicated! Thankful to have found you! Approaching 60, trying to get situated for fixed-income retirement, better nutrition, organics. Small, fenced backyard (thankfully!). Raised beds for easier access. Resting beds when out of compost are excellent idea! So, so much rich information. God bless you!
I concur with you as usual I had planted some shrubs in some bad soil and covered the area with that black fabric that prevents weeds. I got tired of the shrubs so I dug them out. I looked under the fabric and the worms had transformed the area like you wouldn't believe.
I do a bit of both directly laying chopped up scraps in empty spaces between the growing stuff, (or just all over the fallow section) and chucking into a composting trough which I top up with cheap compost from time to time.
Thanks for a really helpful video - I’ve been feeling disorganised and greedy for running out of compost from time to time but it’s reassuring it happens to experts too!
I think he's ready for Hollywood with that opening
😂😂
This guy does a GREAT JOB!! my biggest compost problem is sometimes it's broken down so far that when i actually use it, there's less oxygen available because the compost has broken down so much so I have to add some more recent dead matter to it to break it up
Hiya Mark
I use frozen fish shipping containers as small beds. I fill the bottom with large twigs, top it with leaves from the wild and kitchen scraps, then a thin layer of soil. I throw the seeds knife the surface and then cover it with mulch sa desalinated seegrass cause its free from the beach. It turns into compost within weeks while the plants are growing and doesn't smell. It does need a regular mulch top up though
You could also do something like growing leguminous nitrogen fixing vines like peas or beans, then when you cut back the vines after harvest, the roots will then rot into the soil, adding more nitrogen and organic materials. Also compost the vines so you don't run out next time haha. Cover cropping is a very good permaculture style method that keeps your soil healthy and also productive.
Also many of the pests that you remove from the gardens by resting your soils are also incapable of eating leguminous roots, so this has a similar effect to resting it in that way as well.
Love your channel and thank you for sharing your knowledge. A worm bin is a great way to produce fast compost and cheap. I keep mine in the garage and highly recommend it/them.
Love y our videos - the non-nonsense, straight forward style is great!
You asked if anybody had alternatives to composting. For anybody who has chickens, ducks, large fish etc. I'd recommend starting a Black Soldier Fly bin. They can turn kitchen waste - including meat and fat - into compost in a matter of days. You don't get as much compost as in a compost bin/pile, but you do get a lot of protein rich larvae to feed the chooks etc. They're no good with much garden wast - some greens are okay, but not much. There is plenty of info on RUclips about them. I've had them for three years now, and they're a great supplement for our chooks, and the compost is great too.
If you have a wooden area you could head out there, clear the fresh stuff off the top & take what’s below. Natures compost.
You could also set up another bin somewhere to put extra of that you get free like what you’re using around your fruit trees. It won’t be as good as homemade but could still be usable in the garden when broken down further.
I am fortunate to have an abandoned grassy lot next door to me (someone got burned out by a wildfire) and there's endless grass mould etc available to fill many raised beds. I could also go to roadsides in the country and gather leaflitter and dead grass litter.
I love the bit of acting in the beginning ! You are so adorable!
You make me smile/laugh all the time. Totally love you!!!
comfrey leaves will assist the breakdown of materials faster. you could also mix them into the soil or i usually lay them down in the bed cover with newspaper and mulch and leave for the winter. Pull it back in spring and its beautiful and rich. perennial planting also assists the beds.
Bernadette Hearn you’re not worried about heavy metals in your soil?
That intro was one of the greatest experiences of my life. Thank you for that.
You are awesome Mark
Happy earth day! My neighbor had a tree fall & I asked the tree fellers to dump the mulch on my driveway. My wife noticed there were green leaves ground up in the wood chips. She asked if they would cause a problem. I’m pumped!
I loved your father-in-laws tips for making an inexpensive mulch out of cheap soil and organic fertilizer. I wonder if you could improve it's bio-diversity by adding a shovel full of good rich garden soil letting it "grow" for a few days before adding to the top of the bed. Thanks for the great video.
I recently started saving all the left-over bones from our meals (chicken, beef, lamb etc) in the freezer until I have enough to fill a crockpot. I then stoke the pot up on an outside table and let it simmer away all day on low, until the bones become brittle. The 'juice' is used for making the dog's dinner (cooked with rice and vegetable trimmings) and the bones are dried and then pulverized in the blender to make my own bone-meal. To this I add pulverised dried egg shells along with any out-of-date (and pulverized) cereals, rice, pasta, bread crumbs and nuts and seeds I have; this becomes my 'worm chow' to add to the vermicompost bin and - ultimately - becomes my 'home-grown' soil additive. For some reason, I find I get so much satisfaction out of doing this!!!
I ran out of compost a few months ago when planting, boo, took me a year to make. Already been composting since the same day I ran out. A way to go till it's usable. Just found turmeric growing out of my new compost, haha, cool bonus, repotted it.
Nice tip. Like the blood and bone idea. Another idea I plan to try is use some from creek/forest on some family property.
Chopping banana plant stems and laying them on top of the garden bed keeps the soil hydrated for longer. I find this technique useful during droughts. Conditioned soil keeps nutrients, so you won't have to fertilize as often. I'd grow more bananeiras, since he has the space 😁
I agree with other comments about green manures/cover cropping.. I believe that living root structure is better than none at all.. I’d be curious to see soil tests of cover cropping vs. deep mulching
I agree with you and others about cover cropping - even certain weeds that haven't gone to seed can make a good green manure in a bed.
Ty, i love your channel.. i cant have a compost area because i live in a park.. i have seen your resting videos for area.. so, behinb my greenhouse i have a 2½ x 2 high x 8 ft bed that i use for garlic.. but i have plenty for this winter so i decided to use it for my cardboard, pape, scraps, coffee & tea grounds.. i also, after a heavy rain dig yp worms & put into all my beeds.. ty😊❤
I have a smaller space and garden.
I usually grow in pots.
Some are growing in grounds.
In these lockdown days I have nothing to do rather than staring at all my veggies and feeling the heat of the compost.
In India people can easily collect leaves and Carbon waste to maintain the composting carbon - nitrogen ratio. The sweepers on the roads collect leaves and rather burn then in a pile. I usually take my grass clippings and those tree leaves which have rare minerals also.
Good for nature and free back gold!
Highly informative. I particularly like the tip to use the cheap potting mixes mixed with blood and bone. I always have a spare bag of organic compost in the shed, just in case. The three bay method would not suit me as I am a woman in my late sixties and lack the strength to start spading compost over the fence into the next bay. :) Here is my "three bay" technique. Bay 1 is a plastic Bunnings Reln compost bin with a lid. I tip bucket loads of green and brown materials in there - raw veg scraps, prunings, sugar cane mulch, rotting bush mulch, autumn leaves, and lashings of free coffee grounds from my daily cafe. They bring me a black bag full when they see me coming! Nearby customers look suspicious, as if I am taking part in a drug transfer! hahaha Bay number 2 is a wheelbarrow. I regularly lift off the compost bin and use a light spade or hand trowel to move the top half of the material in the bin onto a tarp. The bottom half contains good compost and some roughage (twigs etc). I wheel up the barrow and use a hand trowel or light shovel to transfer the compost and roughage to the barrow, which may still have some unused compost material in it. I mix it around a little and throw in some more coffee grounds and mix again, wet and leave. I bundle up the tarp with the uncomposted material and tip it back into the compost bin.
Bay number 3 is an unused empty portion of a raised bed. It might have plants in one half and the other half is empty. When I am about to refill the barrow from the compost bin, I bucket out the material lying in the wheelbarrow, in whatever semi-composted state it is in, into the raised bed, and leave it to further rot down or, if I want to plant something at that time, I plant right into it. The plants get a bit of a surprise, being planted directly in semi-composted material, but they usually survive, steady up after a few days, then thrive. Often I find a bit of finer compost to pack around them when I plant them, just to get them going. Then there are black garbage bags full of prunings in the shed, waiting for the next time Bay number 1 is empty (the compost bin). Complex, but it works for me. :)
I wouldn't say "complex" I'd say your composting method is practical! Thanks for sharing your valuable experience and knowledge on composting. Cheers :)
😂 You are fabulous! Kind Regards🌻
i have sandy soil that just eats compost. put it on, a month to 6 weeks later, its gone, right back to beach sand. i cant make enough. as others commented, i also raid the neighbours for anything organic. its is starting to make a difference though. the places where its the 6th-8th application, the compost dissapears at a much slower rate (3-4 months)
A suggestion, on the bed you are resting: put down some palettes and put pots on top of plants/seedlings you want to start or plants you want contained. Or anything else like; compost tumbler, 44 gallon drums etc. A resting bed space can still be used, the soil might a little compacted but if you need the space there are options. :D
G’dayyyy! Thanks for all your great information Mark. Cheers from Charlotte NC USA
I have a ton of space in my organic food forest I'm trying to turn into new garden beds. I simply layer the grass w/ cardboard/ throw tons of wood chip much on it as soon as the ground thaws. By the time I'm ready to plant my seedlings I've grown, I just dig through the decomposed cardboard, add a handful of homemade compost and plant. I've been working on preparing the sites the year before...but have been astounded at how well even new beds like this produce. The original soil. with all the micro-organisms is still thriving and really helps the plants out! Mulching is key! I follow the Ruth Stout method/ " Back to Eden" gardening style. I also do the lazy method of cold pile composting. I have so much to do, and so little time, and so much yard waste. I just layer it...let it be in a pile in the elements, and use it the next year. There is never enough, thou for my grandiose plans:/
I have a deal with my neighbors, they don't use chemicals on their lawn, I get the fresh cut grass & mulch with it.
In return I give them a food box of some of what I produce, fresh tomato's, plum cherries, beets, rainbow chard, kales, ect
The grass fed Vegtables method really helps when you are compost starved.
you are one very special wonderful human, thank you
Very late comment, so I hope y’all get a chance to read this. I use fast composting with bins and slow composting using a trench method my dad showed me. First thing first, create your raised beds by selecting the bed area, dig next to it a trench about a shovel head depth by two shovel heads width piling the soil in the marked bed area. (Free soil to crest beds!) This will give you nice rows to walk in between and easy set up. Next fill the newly formed trenches with leaves, and or grass clippings. So now the walkways become a slow compost trench. When it’s time to make the big changes from summer to fall, and winter to spring you have both compost and mulch ready for the large change outs. I utilize the fast method in my bins to constantly feed the garden and have in hand for the intermediate changes during each cool and warm growing season.
Having a Ford One Toner, helps, using the basics of usable quality products like vegetable scraps from a fruit shop, trying not to use seeding vegetables, or pulp from a Juice shop like carrot pulp, coffee grounds, newspaper mulched up wet or office shredded paper, horse manure from racecourse or bedding both mixed together, saw dust and naturally good quality lawn clippings. I can get free wood chip too from my local council.
It’s been a bit tough with Covid19, Lockdowns but that’s okay, I haven’t ran out yet.
My only suggestion would be buying small bags of compost is extremely expensive when compared to buying a half a tonne of compost or a cubic metre, depending on your needs.
Uncle Harry was a farmer. He used the same 3- bin composting to start. Then he added another just like it on the back. Then an extra bin on outside of each. He also added all the fireplace ashes to his compost. He'd use outside bins for branches of varying sizes and twigs. He collected the whole neighborhoods leaves for free. They'd bring wheelbarrows full to his door. Black gold he called it. They all had evergreens & maples. Birches. Larches. Beech. They couldn't understand why his yard & trees always looked so good and theirs looked lethargic. Lol. But no nut/ oak branches or leaves as they're toxic to other plants. Those he had them bag & set up separate composting area/bins for and only used around those trees.
So great how the overall vibe is that you’re sad for sad for someone who’s out of homemade compost haha. It’s a horrible feeling for sure!
I've started my garden two years ago with only composted leaf and grass. Now I grow a cover crop from fall to spring to chop and drop keeping my soil loose and healthy.
Last year I made two retaining walls on my long thin sloped property which became new beds (20m long x 4m wide x 1m high each). My usual compost system was no way near enough for that scale project. I didn't do any particular research (but was inspired by your hugoculture video). I figured that 30cm of council shredded green waste on top of pretty average fill; and then 10cm of Steve Jones soil on top of that with some mulch would do the trick.
I grew nice corn plants first season in one bed and put in heaps of hippeastrums and bearded iris in the other bed. When I turned the corn bed after harvest, I was pleasantly surprised that a lot of the shredded green waste was in advanced stage of breaking down. I grew sunflower plants in that bed in the second half of spring-summer. I noticed the level had dropped 10cm though so I topped up with more soil and turned. Seems to have worked well. The flower are going great guns as well; and the level hasn't dropped so much in that bed.
Here is an idea for video - any ideas for drying sunflower seeds in bulk? It was a lot of work to extract the seeds and dry. I tried drying some on the head too with varying results. Some got a bit of mildew but the chickens don't seem to care.
Machina Opus when you dry your flower heads, and seeds are ready for harvest, grab a bicycle, turn it to rest on handle bars and seat, then gently peddle bike with 1 hand and hold seed head against spokes of rear wheel (avoid sprocket side) your seeds come out fast, and heaped on your ground cloth ready to store or hull...works great.
Great success story with your raised bed/retaining walls project! I tend to do what you do and dry sunflower seed on the heads then crush them out later to use for the hens or resowing - we don't tend to use them much in cooking etc. The bike trick from Linda seems worth a try! :)
Thank you! This came at the perfect time as we have run out of compost!!! 😭 😁👍
me too, and this post came as usually right on
Hi Mark. Love your videos. Something I'm going to try next summer when its really hot and I'm struggling to grow anything of value, is grow a crop of Alfalfa (aka Lucerne) and dig it back into the soil. Nice and cheap and should add nitrogen and organic matter back into the soil. Keep up the great work!!!
Mark, I just found your channel, and I'm loving it. I'm in Brisbane, and finding people that garden to my climate is difficult! Nice to find another source of info based on experience and common sense, lols.
I can't compost, as I have a TERRIBLE infestation of Coastal Morning Glory. I had no idea what it was when first eagerly setting up my very first vege beds and compost system. The stuff has just exploded with all the goodness I put into the yard, and I underestimated its ability to spread (ANY underground roots down to hair thin cm long pieces, random tiny cuttings or seeds spread by birdies combined with our hot humid summers mean that EIGHT years later, my garden is just a riot of weed even after spending months and months pulling out literal tonnes of it- it even grows meters and meters along concrete to invade pots and is completely resistant to all herbicides). My entire gardening setup has been scaled back to pots and a few garden beds in the front yard, and composting is just out of the question, as the underground root systems travel dozens of meters to find my compost. I've had to develop a few methods to cope with a lack of homemade compost.
First, I do as you say, and the cheap Bunnings compost is fine with some amendments- blood and bone and organic dynamic lifter, which is just chook poo really. One of my favourite fast and cheap fixes is the cheap coir block from Bunnings- it's about $2, and if rehydrate it in water with molasses, seasol, and worm juice (I buy from gumtree for a few bucks off locals), then the mix is good and nutritious and gives things a good jolt, and has the benefit of being a great mulch and water holder too, and the molasses gets the microbes and such going fast. A bag of cheap manure left in the sun for a few weeks with a spray of the hose over it every once in a while makes a fast and cheap compost. Another cheapy, a piece of pipe/old bottle with holes drilled into it, buried into the pot or bed I need boosted, and filled with shredded newspaper and a few soft food scraps like milky bread and covered over with a sturdy pot to keep away pests, and the worms move in right quick, and I can move it again in mere weeks, leaving lovely castings behind. I make my own stock out of vege scraps, and I find that the leftover mushy stuff after simmering for a few hours breaks down pretty quick when buried. Mulching with sugar cane does work well, and I've found that grass clippings work really brilliantly for my pots- I can yank out any new little grass plants very easily in the pots, but it breaks down ultra fast, and is always very moist and dense with fungi when I check under it! A few dark coloured rocks popped here and there on top of the grass around the plant keep it composting nicely in winter, too. My kei apples have actually continued to grow a lot this winter -normally quite slow and dormant- with this method!
I'm glad you did this video- every article and how-to around will tell you that if you add home made compost your crops will explode with growth, but very few tackle how to get things done if you don't have access to your own compost, and I can see a lot of new gardeners either immediately giving up or resorting to chemical fertilisers. I like to see things that encourage new gardeners, when they find things like composting too daunting, but still want to grow some of their own food. Good on you, mate, for stuff like this. I'm loving your positive attitude and give-it-a-go outlook. Thanks for contributing and educating!
I enjoy all your videos. Thank you for sharing your experiences. I look forward to seeing all your other videos. Thumbs up!
If you don't have compost ? I learned to leave your crops roots to rot in the ground all winter! Chop and drop all the weeds in your garden and let them decompose on top of the mulch! Burry banana peels in the ground! You don't need to do much . Worm farms are a must for every Gardner to create the best compost for you!
Man, I sure miss my last place. We had tons and tons of fall leaves. Not only did I have more than enough compost but I was also able to make leaf mold.
Blond & Bone, Yates Dynamic Lifter & Inground perpetual compost bin is an excellent alternative. With an inground bin you use the worms and microorganisms to transfer this method works best for no dig gardeners
thank you for the compost advice.
Im a new gardener and your videos have been very educational and beneficial for my garden.
*Battles against nature are ultimately battles that will be lost.* - Thank you for all that you do, Mark!
That's a lesson Australia learned in blood. Look up the great emu war.
Thumbs up. Love the vids. My worms work in a 3 tier container bin all winter on a massive amount of veggies. To the worm castings I add later, coconut fiber and peat moss. 30% of spent potting soil gets mixed in afterward too, supplimented with azomite @ 1/4 cup per 5 gal. This gets distributed evenly atop the soil prior to its second tilling. Don't ever bring peat moss into the home it makes bugs that will thrive off plants i doors.
Leaves and other yard compost is made separately with wet and dry garden waste such a grass, raked out dry grasses and other foods added over winter supplimented with lots of dry leaves and peat moss. To speed up compodting to a month I mix it all up in early March here in eastern usa and add 5 gallons of a special recipe...
1 cup Cooked rice with original water into the 5 gal bucket chlorine free by sitting overnight adding in 1/2 cup molasses reacts with the rice creating a fast working leaf mold type bacteria which again cuts time to a month or less. The white mold spreads throughout branching from all rice particles like dark energy through space. Some like mixing the cooked rice in first znd dumping the diluted molassed secondatily. In any event, it works really well. Good luck with it and i hope you try and hope you don't mind me sharing success at this without boasting.
Honestly, vermiculture is the richest nutrient way to go.
Additionally some folks say it's not compost unless it has human urine energy once a week 🍯.
Another tip: get or build a proper co.posting bin mice 🐁 can't access. They love food scraps.
thanks for the consistent educational material
Just wanted to thank you for the high quality videos you do. Been watching a few on youtube. Yours and "Epic Gardening" are some of the best on here. Keep up the good work. You have helped me with my Garden. -Steve from Canada