Demystifying compost and muck

The news that there may be a permanent ban on outdoor fires in Taranaki has had me thinking. At first I thought it must only apply to urban areas but there was no mention of that in the early statements from Regional Council. Letter writers to the editor, who applauded the proposal and commented that with the increasingly efficient kerbside recycling services this should not be a problem for people, clearly lived in the city. And I would hazard a guess that they don’t have large gardens.

This is not to say that I am opposed to the idea of discouraging the burning of organic waste, but I am not sure that a blanket ban is the way to go. In a large garden with many trees, we have constant debris. Anything that can be, is composted through our series of compost mounds. Tree branches larger than about 10cm are cut up for firewood but there is all the twiggy stuff in between which up until recently we have dumped on the burning heap in a paddock. Our latest acquisition here is a good solid mulcher bought second hand on Trade Me (and voted by the one who uses it here as his second most favourite piece of machinery). This should eliminate the need for our annual bonfire but, like the chainsaw, mulchers have a petrol powered carbon footprint and are noisy. And mulchers are not going to suit all home gardeners. Nor does the mulcher solve the problem of rose clippings which I still incinerate.

But we would all be foolish not to heed the rumblings. The times they are a-changing and we had better start to think around some of the practices which are becoming increasingly unacceptable.

At the most basic level, the only people I consider justified in putting food scraps out in the rubbish are those who live in apartments with no outside garden. There is not a lot of point in loading landfills with plastic wrapped food en masse when it is very easy to dispose of at home.

So herewith the compost guide for beginners. The very mention of compost arouses passions in some, believe it or not. There are entire books and websites devoted to the topic and they can go into extraordinary technical detail requiring adherence to recipes, a strict timetable of rotation and turning, along with the construction of aerated bins. If you already manage compost in this manner, you do not need to be reading further.

But for beginners, there is compost and there is rotting. Compost is dryish, light, full of air and does not smell. It has been naturally heat treated. Rotting is often pongy, sludgy and heavy. It has not generated heat.

Rotting is fine in some cases and easy to manage. Rather than (horror of horrors) raking up the autumn leaves and burning them, to the detriment of neighbours’ washing and the environment, you can rake them back under the bushes and let them break down naturally. After a few months, you have what is called leaf litter and it is inoffensive, fertile and fine for raking back over the garden beds as mulch.

Kitchen waste is often rotted, rather than composted. In fact the simplest method can be to start a trench in the vegetable garden and bury the scraps, covering them with the soil from the next part of the trench as you work your way along. The worms will then break down the food and it doesn’t take long before you can use the row for planting. The major disadvantage is dogs and you don’t want to be burying meat.

While we have a row of proper compost mounds, they are some distance from the kitchen so we use one of those useful black bins with no bottom in it for food scraps. It looks tidy in the vegetable garden and keeps the dogs out though rats can burrow beneath. We refer to it as the compost bin but in fact the contents are rotted, not composted. We avoid putting any weeds which are seeding in there or any diseased vegetable waste because rotting alone does not kill seeds and fungi. Leaf litter would be fine in one of these black bins if you like to keep the garden tidy. Mark rakes out the contents into the vegetable garden from time to time. Rotting does not have to be unhygienic and in fact you can encourage your own worm farm to do the breaking down for you.

Proper compost is something else entirely. In smaller gardens it is tidier to work on constructed compost bins so you start in one bin, fork it into the second bin (this is aerating it), adding nitrogen if required, and then into the third bin from where you use it for the garden after a few months. We have a large amount of green waste here and sufficient space to manage free form mounds which get turned by the front end loader on the tractor but in days gone by, (before the advent of our baby tractor) Mark used to fork it all over as required. If you are past forking compost, there are more expensive rotating bins on the market.

The whole principle of composting is to generate aerobic action and heat which is what purifies the compost. We all know about grass clippings heating up and steaming but without the addition of air, roughage and carbon you are actually creating something more akin to smelly, fermented ensilage.

Compost aficionados have recipes, not unlike cooking, but we have never felt the need to be so regimented. We pile all the waste into heap number one, grass clippings and all. When the heap is large enough, it gets turned and sprinkled with nitrogen in granular form. If you have chickens, this is the point at which you add chicken manure as a natural source of nitrogen. If you have a lot of grass clippings, they also provide natural nitrogen. Some people like to bring in seaweed or other animal manure at this time but we have quite enough of our own waste, thank you, without needing to gather it up from other sources. The nitrogen is important because that is what starts the aerobic action and the heat which is the all important part to kill the unwanted greeblies. It is now heap number two.

Ideally number two should be turned a second time a week later to keep the composting action in full swing. We turn each mix several times but twice is the minimum. We then cover it with black plastic and leave it for a couple of months before using it, mostly as a garden mulch but also to add goodness and a lighter texture when planting trees and shrubs. We favour a pretty dry mix here. Done properly, it is weed free and clean to handle.

Apparently around 40% of what goes to urban landfill is green waste. If you can deal with it in your own garden, you will certainly be reducing your carbon footprint. Separating out green waste for recycling may be one step better than throwing it in with the polystyrene, plastic and tin but it still requires energy input for it to be collected or delivered and composted at the landfill before you then drive your vehicle to go and buy compost (often in plastic bags) to return to your garden. If you are serious about saving the planet, cut out the middle man and start working out ways to deal with your own green waste at home.

December 28, 2007 Weekly Garden Guide

  • Check out and see if thrips are starting, particularly on your rhododendrons. They build up more in shaded areas and also where there is little air movement. An insecticide spray now is well timed to kill off most of the little critters (look for dark and dirty threads on the underside of the leaves). If you don’t want to spray, at least open up around the plant so it is not crowded and if it is a variety that gets badly affected (you can tell by its silver foliage), consider replacing it with a healthier option better suited to your conditions.
  • Keep copper sprays on tomatoes to prevent blight. Once your plants succumb to the dreaded blight, it can be too late to save them. If you are just starting to develop it (look for black spots on leaves which then wither and shrivel) then remove any affected foliage well away from the plant. Don’t put it in your compost unless you manage to make a hot mix which will kill the spores.
  • Keep successional plantings going on brassicas (cauli, cabbage, Brussels sprouts and broc) as well as leeks, peas, corn and most other vegetables.
  • Most seed sown vegetable crops will need thinning at an early stage and these thinnings can be eaten as micro veg.
  • Make a New Year resolution to stay on top of the weeding and to avoid letting weeds get to the seeding stage. Weeds with seed heads are a real problem. Few people manage compost heaps that will generate sufficient heat to kill the seeds so all that happens is that you spread them far and wide when you use the compost later. And you can’t leave seeding weeds to shrivel in situ if you push hoe because all those seeds will take this as an invitation to grow then and there. Better by far to cut them off before their prime.
  • Grapes need to be thinned – one bunch per runner, if you want good sized fruit. Stay on top of the laterals too, to prevent the foliage from shading and crowding the fruit too much.
  • The only other piece of advice from the House of Jury this week comes not from either of us, but from a Christmas resident who advocated recommending that readers at least sit out in their gardens (between showers) to drink their Christmas booze and to eat their festive fare. You can then make plans for how to improve the outdoor scenery.

The Lure of the Japanese Garden

Authors: Alison Main and Newell Platte
Publisher: Wakefield Press (Price Unknown)

Every now and then a gem of a book turns up for review and this is one. Japanese gardens are a unique identity, resolutely spurning most international gardening influences in favour of symbolism and allusion which can appear austere, stark even, to the uninitiated. Over a number of visits throughout the seasons, the Australian authors have tracked down 120 gardens the length and breadth of the country which took them well beyond the better known gardens featured in most publications.

At one level it is a travel guide and each garden is given one page and one photograph only, with brief and practical advice on how to find them. Other snippets of travel advice are included. The section on Japanese business hotels is very charming.

But it is not just a travel guide. It also gives the historical context for each garden (the different periods for Japanese gardens are an integral factor) and it decodes the symbolism without rendering the whole mystique merely mundane.

Even if you are never likely to go garden visiting in Japan (and it would take real stamina to get to 120 of them) this is a delightful book which gives an insight into the self contained world of Japanese gardens. Anybody who is interested in international gardening would enjoy having this book on their shelves.

Letter to Elton

Dear Elton,

We were very disappointed that your recent trip to New Plymouth was so fleeting that you did not have time to visit our garden. Maybe next time, you will manage more than an eight hour stopover which really only left time for your concert.

We know that you are keen on gardening. In fact we know quite a bit about your garden. So we left word with Somebody We Know in Town who was involved with hosting you, that should you have a bit of spare time, we would love to show you around our place. But it was not to be on this visit.

We know your tastes are quite particular. That there are various plants and flowers you hate. Gladiolus feature high on the hate list. That is fine. We don’t grow the Dame Edna type of gladdies. All we have are a few tasteful and understated species and only one of those is in flower at this time of the year. It could have been like a little test to see if you spotted it in the rockery. It is a curious beige colour with burgundy spotting so it may have attracted your attention, but unless you know gladiolus species you may not have picked what it is.

We agree with you that marigolds are common. Nor are we fans of carnations. When somebody gives you carnations, there is always the suspicion that they buy their flowers from the supermarket or the petrol station, don’t you think? Big blowsy dahlias are so vulgar and OTT really, without even the bonus of fragrance. At the risk of alienating every Dutch reader, I must admit that I am not a fan of tulips either. The weird colour mixes and frilly ones just don’t do it for me though a sea of pure perfection in a single colour is not so bad.

We would have been so tactful had you found the time to visit us. We would not have mentioned your major aberration in Good Taste. We refer to the ever so slightly tacky dinosaur that you have in your garden (a gift from George Harrison, we understand. How polite of you to keep it.) I don’t think you would have found any such lapses in decorum in our garden, at least not of that magnitude.

We know about your garden and your dinosaur because we watched Rosemary Verey walking around yours with your head gardener. Sure Mrs Verey died some years ago (maybe you have had second thoughts about Dino since that footage was shot?) but the Living Channel is not always up to the moment with its garden programmes.

Mrs Verey was such a quintessentially English gardener, wasn’t she? Highly skilled, clearly of good stock and well mannered but such a fine plantswoman. We did try growing her Lavatera Barnsley but it wasn’t quite the stop you in your tracks performer here that it is in the UK. In fact it staged a bit of a takeover bid here and while it flowered well, as it grew ever larger it tended to become increasingly scruffy and to fall apart. We cut it out after a season or two.

But we have a profound respect for Mrs Verey and what we saw of her garden and you must have too, as she was closely involved in the development of yours. It may even have been her who placed Dino in your garden after you had accepted him as a gift. Rather than making him a major focal point, Dino appeared to have been tucked discreetly amongst the undergrowth and the overgrowth. We watched her walking your garden and pausing by Dino, commenting that he seemed to have settled in rather well now. At the time we both burst out laughing because we interpreted that comment as a veiled reference to a hope that in another year or two the foliage around would have grown sufficiently to block out all sight of Dino, but we wouldn’t have told you that had you come to our place to visit.

And yes we do know that you call George’s gift Daisy, not Dino. But really, how can anyone take seriously a fibreglass tyrannosaurus rex of such magnitude that it requires a helicopter to move it and with glow in the dark red eyes, when it is called Daisy?

Nor would we mention the figure of Aphrodite inside a red British Telecom box residing in your woodland area. But we do notice that you lean towards tasteful terracotta pots rather than the garish glazed ones more popular here. Same with us, but alas the distance is rather too great for us to manage those charming Cretan olive oil jars which you have flanking your potager.

We would have been curious to hear why you replaced Mrs Verey’s pride and joy, the white garden (well, whitish really, when you read the list of plants ) which your bedroom overlooks. It sounded so lovely when she wrote about it, but apparently you have replaced it with an Italian garden. She seemed ever so slightly miffed that you chose to go with statuary and vistas instead. In the nicest possible way, she made it pretty clear that this seemed a very odd choice to complement your English regency residence and rococo garden.

To be honest, we are not really rococo here but we are deeply envious of your nineteen acre woodland, all maintained and underplanted in a woodland-y sort of way (as opposed to an herbaceous border sort of way). It makes our woodland gardens feel very small and paltry.

But a couple of weeks ago you would have caught the tail end of the nuttallii rhododendrons which are always some of the last to flower for us. I am sure you would have liked these, though I doubt you can grow them in the UK with your harsh winters. They are all class, the nuttalliis. Big, reasonably spectacular (in a refined sort of way) with divine fragrance in most of them. Long white trumpets and big, textured foliage. They can be a bit open in their growth but the peeling cinnamon bark is such a reward for the open habit. I think you would have been moderately impressed by them.

And a couple of weeks ago, we could have shown you our baby kereru which has now flown the nest and our little family of five moreporks which have since dispersed. A visit could have been such fun.

Do feel free to call if you are passing this way again.

Sincerely,

Abbie

December 21, 2007 Weekly Garden Guide

If you have left your run this late preparing the outdoors for impending visits by sometimes critical relatives, at least mow the lawns. If you can manage more, then remember that first impressions count so tidying the stretch from the letter box to the door is a start. Neat edges and swept paths have more immediate impact than a weed free garden. You have left it too late to spray weeds with glyphosate (Round Up) before Christmas (it takes from 10 days to three weeks to work) but boiling water will instantly kill pesky weeds in paved areas.

  • If you are not a tidy or enthusiastic gardener, do not apologise to visitors. Practice throwing away airy comments such as, “We think matrix planting is the way to go, don’t you?” “We are trying a more natural way to manage our garden, organic almost.” “A weed is just a plant in the wrong place.” “We are working on a meadow garden.”
  • Heed the rumblings about rubbish, burning and the environment. If you have never had a compost heap, it might be timely to suggest that a compost bin would make an acceptable last minute gift.
  • There may not be a great deal of intensive gardening going on over the next week but if you want some quiet time, deadheading and weeding are never ending tasks.