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Hi all. I might make some compost-turning manufacturers mad, but I thought I'd share this info. There's so much out there that is just to make a buck, and doesn't actually help or improve a garden, so I couldn't resist sharing it with you all.
First off, thanks kefir mama for the very interesting read!
I was with the author pretty much all the way through, re the "no turn" necessity for piles. If properly comprised, or if adequate ventillation is provided (I use "pipes" of hardware cloth inserted several places in my pile to create chiminey-like thingys).
But.....and I [u]do[/u] mean butt.......I draw the line at "Humanure"! "Eewwwww"!!! :O
Sorry Mr. Jenkins (the author), but as has so often been said on these forums: "Just cause it's natural or organic don't necessarily mean it's safe!!!" I mean, yeah, just cause it'll eventually decompose......I still don't wanna grow my tomatoes in it!
After all, the "B" stands for "Bacon" Lettuce & Tomato sandwich.....Not "Butt"! gardenz
LOL I'm so glad this came up right away! His book (which is available in it's entirety, free, on that site) is QUITE an interesting read.
What's funny is that we will use animal manures, but think that the human's manure is somehow wrong. Mind you, I'm not trying to convince you to go potty in your compost bin. Not at all!! There are all sorts of manures you can use: even green manures (i.e. plants). Since I live in an apartment, having a composting toilet is not practical at all, so green manures (and local free hrose manure) is what I need to do for my plants.
The bio-intensive way of gardening http://www.growbiointensive.org/ (which is not affiliated with Mr. Jenkins, btw) sells seeds for green manures. Apparently, these things (alfalfas, clovers, vetches, etc. which are listed in the compost crop section of their catalog) send roots down for miles, fiberizing the soil (breaks up clay, and binds together loose soil) as well as providing all that needed nitrogen.
And you're right, manure compost (except rabbit)is NOT safe for use in any food plantings unless it is aged for at least 12 months. At that point, it's a rich humus, having no smell/look/consistency of what it used to be before composting with proper ingredients.
I eeeewwwed when I first heard of composting toilets. I thought that it would be really gross, smelly, and not fun to deal with (how nice that I was totally wrong--they have zero smell, much better than water-wasting standard toilets). Anyway, I completely understand the natural revulsion that a typical American would have to this. Still, I highly recommend reading as much of that online book as you are interested in. It's very informative, and funny as heck. it's quite an interesting read!
As any meat or dairy is, traditionally, a no-no for any compost pile, and most homo sappies down lots of Mickey D's and BBQ! that's most likely reasoning behind excluding "humanure" or any other meat eating creature's poo for that matter.
Horse, cow, chicken, wabbit manure passes the "vegan only" manure standards. Hmmm? Raises a question? Wonder if "humanure" from an orthodox vegan would be acceptable?
I am all for no turning. In fact I think making a compost heap is a waste of time in the first place. What happens in nature? Leaves and other plant residues fall on the ground where nature very aptly decomposes it with a variety of mostly microscopic critters and worms etc. It ends up back in the soil to enrich it and improve the tilth. Hadn't one ought to learn something from this and just spread those organic residues on the garden and be natural? And leave the lawn clippings on the lawn to enrich the lawn? Heavens, why make work for oneself when nature is ready to get those jobs done for us? far better to spend our time watching birds, and listening to the corn grow on these warm days. And instead of buying a drum with a crank on it we could take the grandkids for ice cream cones. (a lot of times)
Makin a compost pile can be as much work, or as convoluted as one chooses. There are "layering" fanatics". "Turning & aerating afficianadoes". "Anal measurers of equal measurements of green and brown". Those who crumble/cut/shred everything to fine tilth, and those that just toss stuff in chunks, bunches and clods! Tumblers, wire cages, wooden bins or open pits. It's all your own preference. And we all use/need it for different reasons.
I have many specifically delineated perennial beds and borders (as well as raised veggie beds). If I just let everything "rot where it fell". I'd have an unholy mess. Things [u]always[/u] break down faster and finer, when they're given a little extra attention. Sure nature takes care in her own way. But some of us don't have the 5 or 10 years for all that stuff to decompose into the black gold that we so desparately need each season to fertilize and/or augment our beds and borders.
My deal with DH is one week he gets to leave mulched grass clippings on lawn...next week I get them for adding to pile of last year's shredded leaves. It's a system. Sometimes a game. But it works for us and it's fun and satisfying to know we assisted in making something a little quicker than Ma Nature. It's free and we're not clogging up landfills.
Question for Gardenz. Are you on the staff of Organic Gardening Magazine? Whether you are or not I have a file I would like to send you. I will need your email address, but you probably do not want to post it here. The file is my story about how I fed a bunch of youngsters. If this is of any interest to you send me an email at K7OA@arrl.net CU Jim
HI gardenz. What I found so fascinating about his book was how low-fuss composting can be. He says you should also throw all your meat, oils, dairy and bones in the compost heap-->every bit of non-plastic non-toxic-chemical that goes through your house (at least when manure is one of the components as well--and I'm sure it would work with any animal manure, including human), and it decomposes into perfect black gold. He has studies to back him up (large bibliography). He's been doing this since the 70s. In fact, he said he has put a chicken in there who got sick and died, and six months later there was no sign of her--she had become one with the earth. He has had his composted material tested, and found it lacking in NOTHING. The tester was dumbfounded as to how this could be. Think about it---it's all very natural. Sure, old-fashioned and gross sounding to the modern American, but...meat, dairy, bones, poo...it all has to recycle to the earth at some point, no? Composting it, to me, is completing the grand circle, leaving a smaller imprint on this earth, replenishing rather than stripping away. I wish I had land and could compost the resources my body makes.
We all follow prescribed ways of composting according to the experts, and it makes me a little sad that people make it so hard on themselves, and throw out stuff.
The basic premise is the nitrogen-rich ingredients (urine and feces) mixed with whatever other household 'waste', not including chemicals, but definitely including weeds. Then, with a good portion of carbonaceous stuff (sawdust, rice hulls, straw, whatever), it just naturally takes over and does it's thing! i just got some horse manure today that has aged three years with straw. It is so beautiful and fluffy, no smell... The woman said her father grew tomatoes directly in the manure (I assume it was aged, but don't know for sure), and he has tomatoes growing up the walls and on top of his roof, they did so well!
I wonder what would happen for someone who read the book with an open mind, and resesrved judgement until after they had read everything--seeing what they thought/felt after armed with all the information?
Jamaica--I have to agree with you, when dealing with plant-only residues. It is modern man's desire for a 'perfect' looking garden that has him keeping things in a controlled and nice looking fashion.
I compost what I would otherwise throw out from my kitchen, but I don't make a big deal out of it. I throw it in the box or bag outside, and cover it with dirt so there are no flies. Dying plants, or tree leaves that float into my pots stay there and become mulch. I even leave most of the spider webs.
I'm more concerned with how much food am I getting and how healthy are the plants, rather than with aesthetics. if I ever grow a lawn (which would only be as a pathway between growing beds---and, would only happen if I were to get some poperty ;-), I would mow and leave the blades on top of the grass to meld back in as they naturally decomposed. I'm with ya, sister!
I'm a lazy pile-it-up & let-it-rot composter, only 'turning' my compost piles in fall, when I attempt to mix in more fallen leaves, (I figure the sticks & tougher flower stalks keep enough air pockets & stirring compost is HARD!) but I live in the country & can have 3 or 4 giant heaps going all the time. But, I admit to preferring a more contrived garden design, one that is thought-out in order to please the eye with its color choices, foliage shape, & height changes,...& I'm a meticulous 'groomer' of my borders, snipping off the dead flower heads, sheering back fading perennials to give the plant behind it a chance to shine as it comes into peak bloom. Although I hear what you're saying about being laid-back in your gardening style, and although I apply the principles of nature in the way I fertilize and mulch, to allow a messy look in my borders, well, that's just not in me.
'digging fool'
Posts: 2 | Location: http://www.procopiofundraising.com | Registered: February 11, 2002
Thank you for this posting, it was very enlightening. I am sort of a disorganized gardener in a lot of ways. I don't turn my compost or do a lot of things simply because I have so little time. Lately my ambition has been to finish building and planting the bed I solarized last summer to kill St. Johns wort, to get the compost out to the bin, to finish mowing the lawn and to keep the plants alive that I have in pots for the new bed and future ones. That said, I guess that given a perfect world with the time to experiment more and fewer neighbors and (yuck)rats & other rodents to attract I would consider adding all kitchen waste to the compost heap. I will probably start adding some grain and vegi matter that I have avoided until now (cooked and buttered). Human wastes are not an option here in suburbia bowever and I won't be adding meat scraps and bones because of rodents and smell. That said, I throw very little in the trash anyhow. Some weeks just a little grocery bag size with less than a cup of food scraps.
A book you might enjoy, if you haven't already read it, is "The One Straw Revolution" by Masanobu Fukuoka. This guy has eliminated as many useless garden practices as possible. He has reduced the work he has to do to the bare minimum, and still has great harvests. Plus there's lots of philosophy thrown in. Just thought you might like it if you're looking into getting rid of superfluous gardening activities.
This has been amost interesting thread to me. We have no running water, thus no septic system. For the first three years we used the bucket toilet system. After each "deposit" we added peat moss or ashes from out fire place to cover everything, no smell what so ever. The bucket was emptied into a separate compost pile away from the garden and spring fed creek where we get our water. It was covered with a layer of hay each time we added to it. The pile was used for three years and never got any bigger than one foot tall, just kept composting I guess. We have graduated to a commercial composting toilet. We don't like it at all are are probably going back to out original system- works much better. If our compost pile ever gets large enough we will start another and let that one sit for a year. I won't put it on my veggie garden but I am sure I can find a place for it. I also have a compost pile for my garden where I put kitchen waste (dogs and cats get all meat, bones and dairy). This is added to my worm castings for potted plants and the rest goes to the garden at planting time. We have raised beds and all are covered with hay every year, including walkways. All garden waste is thrown into the walkways along with wood shavings and bark (my hubby makes rustic furniture)and anything else we need to get rid of. In the fall when we work up our beds we can just pull the old hay back and plant or add some rich black dirt from our walkways. It really is a very simple system. No weeds with the hay, if we start to get a few weeds, just throw some more hay on. I don't ever get this long winded but this thread just hit me and I thought someone might be interested.
Glad you posted this. I like the no-turn idea and enjoyed reading all the replies on this topic. And, gulp, I ordered the Humanure book from my library. Should come in any day now.
Don't know if I can bring myself to shlep my own "manure" out to the compost pile, but it sure makes sense.
