I have a big family.
My husband and I have five children.
We are relatively health conscious, so we consume a lot of fresh
produce. Not only that, we raise our own
animals. We have cows, dogs, chickens,
horses, sheep, a rabbit, the works. It
goes without saying that we produce a lot of waste. I have heard about composting, but I want to
learn more. How did this whole
composting thing get started? What exactly is backyard composting? Why do
people do it? How do I get started?
I learned from the Environmental Protection Agency’s
website, www.epa.gov, that food scraps and
yard waste make up between 20 and 30 percent of what American’s throw
away. That seems like a lot, and seems
like an accurate estimate for my family.
The EPA explains that “making compost keeps these materials out of
landfills where they take up space and release methane, a potent greenhouse
gas.” If my family can utilize our waste to create something that we can
benefit from rather than harming the environment, I want to learn more.
On the surface it seems like backyard composting is at worst
a strange practice for a cult-like few and at best a fleeting fad. What is the real backstory? Well, according
to the University of Illinois Extension, composting has basically been around
forever. There is evidence of composting
in Ancient Greece, Rome, Mesopotamia, and Arabia. Ancient civilizations in North America also
utilized composting, and even the farmers of New England would mix fish and
muck in compost piles. In the early 20th
century with the development of chemical fertilizers, agriculture increasingly
turned to chemicals over compost. With
the publication of An Agriculture
Testament in 1943 by British Agronomist Sir Albert Howard, interest in
organic methods and benefits of compost were renewed. These methods are becoming increasingly
popular today.
According to the EPA’s explanation Composting at Home, all composting requires three basic
ingredients: browns, such as twigs and dead leaves, greens, like fruit and
vegetable scraps, and water. These three
ingredients are layered with the browns providing the carbon, the greens
providing the nitrogen, and the water providing the moisture. Sounds interesting, but what are the
benefits? For me personally, one of the
coolest things is that compost reduces the need for the use of chemical
fertilizers. It also suppresses plant
disease and pests, and reduces what goes into the landfill.
The steps under How to
Compost At Home on the EPA’s website make it sound pretty simple. The five bullet points include selecting a
dry, shady location near a water source, layering browns and greens making sure
that larger pieces are chopped up, adding water as you go, mixing grass
clippings and making sure fruit and vegetable waste is buried at least 10
inches, and then adding a tarp on top to keep the pile moist if you want. The conclusion is that, “When the material at
the bottom is dark and rich in color, your compost is ready to use. This
usually takes anywhere between two months to two years.”
Learning about the history, benefits, and components of
backyard composting makes me eager to get started. If I can help my family utilize our waste for
our own benefit as well as the benefit of the environment, I think it is worth
the effort.
Works Cited:
Friend, Duane and Smith, Martha A. Composting for the Homeowner: History of Composting. University of
Illinois Extension, pars. 1-5, https://web.extension.illinois.edu/homecompost/history.cfm.
Accessed 19 May 2018.
Composting at Home.
United States Environmental Protection Agency, pars. 1-4, www.epa.gov/recycle/composting-home.
Accessed 19 May 2018.
No comments:
Post a Comment