Composting

Composting is the breaking down of plant remains and other once-living remains such as leaves, kitchen scraps and so forth. Most of these materials will make a dark, earthy, crumbly substance that is wonderful for enriching your garden soil. It is the best way to recycle your yard and kitchen wastes, and is a critical step in reducing the garbage that we needlessly send to landfills for disposal. It's fairly easy to learn the process.

There are a tremendous number of options for containing your compost. Some people choose to, simply build a compost pile in a convenient spot on the ground. If you are the creative type you can build bin from materials such as pallets, or two-by-fours and plywood. And, of course, there are many commercial bins on the market to choose from.

Composting is not new it has been around for a very long time. In the natural world, it is what happens as leaves pile up on the forest floor and begin to decay. Eventually, those rotting leaves will return to the soil, where living roots can finish the recycling. Composting may be at the root of agriculture as well. Some speculated that as early peoples dumped the wastes from their food in piles, these wastes rotted and were wonderful habitat for the seeds of any food plants that happened to sprout there. It is almost certain people began to realize that these dump heaps were good places for crops and they began to put seeds there intentionally.

Today, the use of composting is expanding rapidly here in the United States and in many other countries, as space for landfills is becoming scarcer and much more expensive. People have become more aware of the environment and of the impacts of all the landfills. In ten years, or maybe even less, composting will have the same impact as recycling aluminum cans and bottles is today, both in our own backyards and industrially. Many states have already stated goals to drastically reduce the volume of waste being sent to landfills. Utilizing yard and kitchen wastes is a big part of the plan to minimize waste overall.

You can contribute by composting yard and kitchen wastes right in you own back yard. If you are fortunate to have a large yard, you can compost in a three-bin system out by the back fence. Some Cities and towns are already promoting composting through home composting education efforts and the collection of yard wastes for large-scale composting. Whatever your style may be I am sure there are more wonderful ways to get involved.