 Hey y'all, it's Crystal from Crystal's Den and Garden, aka Crystal's Den, and I'm here to talk to you about one of my favorite topics, compost. We're gonna discuss what exactly is compost, what are the benefits of compost, but we can and cannot probably shouldn't compost, and I'm gonna show you two methods of composting that I use and that I find super low maintenance and really effective. Composting is such a beneficial act that we can do for the mom or earth and for ourselves. One of my favorite benefits of compost is the amount of waste it reduces. Where I live, 15 to 25 percent of the landfill is filled with yard waste and that doesn't even account for the other organic matter like food scraps and paper products that are in the landfill as well. So when we compost, we are recycling that waste back into the earth instead of filling it with landfills that are just emitting a methane gas that is not good for the environment. So composting really has great benefits in terms of just making the sustainable choice for the earth. And then when you get that lovely compost, you have some great nutrients to add to your garden. What exactly is composting? What is compost? Well, compost is basically the decomposition or breakdown of organic matter. Bacteria and fungi use this broken down matter to, well, they use water and air to help break down the matter and eat it essentially. So they eat it and that helps it decompose and break down into this wonderful rich, humus-like soil that is called compost. And when we use compost, we can use it to make our soils better. So for example, with clay soil, it can be really compacted. But when you add compost to it, it helps loosen it up a bit. With sandy soil, it can be really hard for water to maintain moisture. And so when you add compost to it, it helps to retain moisture much more better. And then when we add that compost to our plants, it makes our plants feel super happy because they get these great nutrients and they grow in a great abundance. So compost just has some really great benefits. And it is a perfect way to recycle our scraps and waste back into the earth and use it for great purposes. The bugs, we cannot forget about the bugs. The earthworms, they also help our our organic matter decompose and become this great compost. They eat it, they poop it out and it just helps with the whole process. So definitely can't forget about them. So what makes up our compost? Well, we have our nitrogen rich material or our green material or wetter material. That's going to be things like food scraps, vegetable food scraps, fruit food scraps, eggshells, grass clippings, fresh grass clippings. Excellent because they have a high nitrogen content. It's going to be our tea, our coffee grounds, our nuts, any type of foliage. We don't want like the roots of weeds or anything, but any type of foliage or like plant that you have, or maybe a plant that's not producing fruit anymore, all great nitrogen rich material that can go into the compost. Then we also have our carbon rich material, which is going to be our brown material or more drier material. And that's going to be things like cardboard and not just the regular cardboard we know, but also toilet paper roll cardboard and paper towel roll cardboard. Going to be really great brown material to add to compost. What else can be composted? Our sawdust can be composted. Paper, like regular paper, mail that you get can be composted. Nothing shiny or with the plastic slip, but just regular paper. We also can compost newspaper, not the glossy coupon paper. We want to recycle that, but the regular newspaper, we can recycle, we can compost that along with uncoated paper products like paper towels, toilet paper, toilet tissue, and then wood chips also really great for composting. And then small, small, small twigs, small, small twigs. This is all some really great brown material that we can compost that we can add to our compost bins and piles. And I just want to say that whenever we have our paper products, or whether it be newspaper, paper, paper towel, regular paper, we just want to make sure that we tear it up really good so that it is easier to decompose and easier for the bacteria and fungi to break it down and get it ready for us. I can't believe I forgot one of our essential compostable materials, which is dried leaves. Dried leaves are an excellent source of brown material and great to add to your compost. A couple other things that are really great to add are also hay and straw. And also with your cardboard and like brown paper sacks or anything like that, make sure you're also tearing those up when you add them to your compost. Breads, pastas, and grains are also compostable. Try and avoid composting sweet breads like cake or Twinkies. And also avoid composting. Pasta has a lot of meat or dairy residue on it. A few other things we can compost are pet fur, hair, dust from a dust pan, wood ashes, ashes from medicinal herbs that we've either smoked or burned. And this next one is sparingly because we don't want to bring too much smell to our compost, but beer and wine are also compostable. Water and aeration are also essential components to our compost. And those come a bit later whenever we make our piles or have our bins because then when you add that water and the aeration that gives the bacteria and fungi ways to use it to break down the decomposed matter and make it into that great compost. So we've gone over items that we can compost, but what are some things that we shouldn't compost? I will say that some of these items that I'm naming can be composted in certain environments, but from the methods that I'll show you today, they are not good to compost in. So this would be things like meat, dairy, oils, animal bones, pet feces, greases, anything like that we don't want to throw in our home compost, especially if you're starting out. Like I said, there are other methods that support composting some of those things, but for what I'll show you today, it will not be the best. Composting things like that will bring rodents or pests, unwanted pests, and will have really bad smells and it may make the decomposition process kind of slow a bit slower. So stay away from composting those types of materials. Now that we know what compost is, what we can and cannot compost and the benefits of composting, let's now talk about where our compost can be located and methods of composting. Where you want your compost to be located is up to you. I personally have chosen shaded areas so that the compost doesn't dry out, and I also chose areas that, well one that was close, kind of close to my back door, so like for easy throwing out, and a couple areas that are just close to the garden for when it's time to add the compost to the garden. So really make sure that you are choosing a spot in your yard or wherever you're composting that is convenient for you, that doesn't have too much sun, and is conducive to composting in. While there are various methods of composting, the two that I'm going to show you today are the trenching or bearing method and cold or passive composting. I really like these forms of composting because they're low maintenance and easy to maintain. The trenching or bearing method has been one that I have been using for the past two years. Essentially what you do is you dig a hole, doesn't have to be a big one, just big enough to hold whatever amount of compost that is that you're dumping, and you throw the compost in there. I usually like to add some type of brown material to mix in there to kind of offset the smell a little bit, so whether that be leaves or wood chips or cardboard, adding that in is always going to be a beneficial factor, and then you throw the dirt back on top, add in a little bit more brown material such as some wood chips or cardboard, and call it a day. I like this method because the compost is nice and buried, so there is definitely not room for a pest to come. That was my main kind of concern when I first was composting was I didn't want pests coming, and so I found this method to be perfect because since the compost was kind of hidden, then it was easy for it to one breakdown and to not be messed up by anything in like by any type of rodents or pests. So trenching or bearing is a very effective method. It's simple. When we want to add that water or aeration, you can water the pile, the area where you bury the compost, and I usually like to bury it a little bit shallow so that when I do want to turn it or mix it, I can easily kind of unlift it from the earth and mix it a bit. So burying and the trenching slash the trenching method is very effective, really easy, and just perfect for composting. The other methods of composting that I utilize are cold composting or passive composting, and I do that in a couple different ways. Let me show you. So I have a bin here that I have been adding compost to. As you can see, there are holes throughout the whole bin to provide aeration. That way I don't have to worry about turning it as much. If you look inside, we'll see I have a mix of my brown material and then buried in there. It's a lot of the nitrogen rich material or our green material. Whenever you're having a bin like this, it's always good to have a good ratio of browns to green. Some people like to do three-part brown, one-part green. Some people like to do two-part brown, one-part green. I would suggest doing at least two or three to one, especially if you are cold composting, just so that you have that brown material to neutralize the smell and so that there won't be too much of a stinky compost. Here is my cold pile. Now this pile is filled with, I had put old, if you can see right there, old sunflower stalks at the bottom. Big shout out to Zero Journey for that tip. When you add those stalks at the bottom, it creates a natural aeration and then what I've done is just added a variety of things from food scraps to grass clippings to lots of brown material in there to again get that brown material to neutralize the smells but also add in that great ratio of browns to greens. This is a pile that I just let sit along with my bin. I turn them occasionally. I water them occasionally but I don't do too much to them so as not to overburden myself and to still maintain that low maintenance compost style. Now the holes in my trash can though do provide oxygen or aeration and the sticks and the sticks sunflower stalks underneath the cold pile provide aeration as well but it is good to turn the pile occasionally to get in order to move everything around a bit and get more airflow in there as well. I usually like to turn the one in the bin when I dump my food scraps and brown material in there and then the one, I'm not going to lie the one, the cold pile, sometimes it may take me a couple weeks until I turn that one but you know that's the thing about this type of composting when you turn it and you know how often it's really kind of up to you the more you turn the more the quicker to break down but I also don't put too much pressure on myself to be turning all the time just you know once maybe once a week maybe once every two weeks just whenever it's you know convenient for me but you know it is good to turn it occasionally to get that good more airflow getting going in there. In terms of watering those areas having that green material is gonna slash the water material is gonna allow for the compost to remain nice and damp but if you do notice that your pile is getting dry it is good to water it add some water to it I do that with with both of these if I think it's getting too dry and that will allow you to keep that good balance of adding that H2O with the air ration along mixed with your green and brown materials. Let me show you a cold pile that I started back in April and that is almost done breaking down and that I will be using in my fall garden. This is the result of a cold pile that I had started back in April I probably turned this pile a total of four times and I also added to it for about a month so it's been breaking down since then I'm really liking the way it looks the soil feels nice and fluffy you can still see like bits of like twigs and some remnants of leaves but the soil feels really good and it's starting to look really nice so I'm really excited I'm going to be adding this to my fall garden. Thank you so much for watching whether you start composting today tomorrow in 10 years five years I really hope that this video gave you some information on the benefits of it how you can get started what you can just compost and the ways that you can compost your compostable materials thank you again for watching this has been Crystal from crystals then in garden aka crystals then and I can't wait to talk with you next time happy composting