When it comes to composting, there's several ways to do it, but not all of these will work best for you. Factors such as cost, ease of use and capacity will play a part in determining what you end up choosing.
First up, costing zero dollars, is digging a hole and burying your food scraps. It really is that simple. There's no cost in digging a hole, and there's no maintenance involved. Further, there's no real compost to obtain, either. Since it's being buried, airflow is reduced to a minimum and this process can take a few years to work.
Animals and pests might find your treasure trove of snacks and dig it up, but that doesn't always happen. Neighbors might get annoyed if they see you doing it. But don't neighbors get annoyed about everything? I buried my food scraps for years before I decided to take the next steps with composting.
Compost bins are easy to build yourself with a few pallets or some drywall mesh/chicken wire. If you want a nice and manufactured one, they can cost around $25 or $30 and get the job done. They can hold a lot of material, so this is a good option for someone with a big yard requiring maintenance.
The big downfall with compost bins is turning the material over. It can be hard work involving a lot of shoveling and poking around. If this is no concern for you, great. A compost bin might be considered unsightly to some as well. Not me.
Next up is vermicomposting. Worms are a great educational tool and kids love them. They work year round, and make great castings to use as a soil amendment in your garden.
However, worms need love and attention. Overfeeding, overwatering, lack of feeding and lack of watering can severely hurt or kill off your whole worm population. This being said, once you get the hang of how they work, they're quite easy to maintain. Of the different worm systems, I feel like all the high end systems do good work, while making your own worm bin is probably the least effective, unfortunately. This is due to lack of airflow in a plastic bin, which allow it to get too soggy and the worms hate it.
Lastly is the compost tumbler. I hate them because they're expensive, but I love them because they're so easy to use. It's easy to rotate the contents without breaking your back, and they're quite neat and secure from pests/animals. Look for a tumbler that's at least 50 gallons in capacity and is ergonomically fitting for you.
There's lots of compost tumbler models out there, and many of them are quite lackluster. Take your time to decide what seems best. Look for one with good airflow, which is the key to a tumbler's success.
Composting can be as simple or as fancy as you like, and as you can see there's many options available to get started. For those of you on the fence, I hope this has helped you decide what will work for you (full disclosure- I use all four).
If you're looking to learn more about composting, chances are I've covered your questions at my site, http://www.crazyaboutcompost.com. Check it out today and gain access to a free 7-day composting course to teach you how to compost with ease at home.
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