Start Composting

By composting your own kitchen waste and using it on your garden you are not only improving your plants and vegetables, but also helping the planet!

And it is very simple:

• build a compost heap
  If you have space somewhere in a corner in your garden, build one yourself:
  you can use old pallets or hammer four post in the ground 1m apart and tack wire or wooden planks around them and leave the front open to make a cubic metre (1x1x1m) compost heap.
• buy a composting bin
  these are enclosed bins in various shapes and sizes with a lid at the top and a door in the bottom to remove finished compost

What to put in your compost heap or bin:

• brown waste
  twigs
  broken up branches
  leaves (not too much in one go)
  straw
  cardboard
• green waste
  vegetable and fruit peelings
  uncooked vegetables or fruit
  weeds
  grass cuttings (not to much in one go)
  egg shells
  tea bags and coffee grinds (including paper filter)

What NOT to put in your compost heap or bin:

• cooked food
• meat, fish, egg (shells are fine, egg is not)
• dairy products
• cat litter
• nappies
• best not to put leaves from homegrown tomatoes, potatoes, cucumbers, pumpkins and courgettes as these are likely to contain spores of a virus or fungi, like blight. I always throw out the leaves of these vegetables with the general waste.