If you have an empty space big enough for a garbage can, you can build your own urban compost.
It sounds harder (and smellier) than it is. You will create nutrient-rich fertilizer out of garbage; you won’t leave your apartment smelling like you’ve converted your space into a landfill.
What is a compost pile for?
Compost is fertilizer made from leftover food and plant trimmings, and used to add nutrients to plants and garden soil. Traditionally, compost piles are found in rural backyards, but urban dwellers can enjoy the eco-friendly benefits of composting along with their suburban neighbors. All it takes is the right kind of bin, a small space, and the desire to turn your leftovers into more than useless garbage.
Bins, Buckets, and Worms. Oh my!
Composting is a beautiful, natural way to turn garbage into fertilizer; your compost bin can look just as beautiful. Dozens of stylish, functional compost bins are available to the urban dweller. Choose from a variety of shapes and materials: bamboo, ceramic, and stainless steel. Be sure the lids fit well to keep bugs away, and don’t forget the carbon filters to keep the smell away.
While you don’t have to use worms to create your compost, they do make the best fertilizer – if you can get over any queasiness you might feel about keeping upwards of 1000 worms in a bin on your fire-escape, closet, or deck. Quick biology lesson: worms feast on your leftover food waste, then turn around and excrete the waste in the form of nutrients. Natural and easy, and delicious to your plants and windowsill garden.
If you’re up for composting with worms, we recommend this worm composting guide book.
How to Get Started
Now that you’ve got your bin and a space to store it, you need to start filling it up. To make compost you’ll need dead leaves, plant trimmings, vegetable and fruit leftovers, and a little water to mix everything together and break it down into fertilizer.
- Throw in the dead leaves and dirt and a little water.
- As you cook, add the leftover scraps from your fruits and vegetables to the leaves in your new compost bin.
- When you’ve got a little pile going, add some plant trimmings and stir it all together to get the process started.
Continue repeating the three-step process for several weeks until you have a dark, rich compost ready for spreading over the soil in your planters or in a neighborhood garden.
Living a green lifestyle can be just that easy! Have you already created an urban compost that you can brag about? We’d love to hear it! Share it with us here, on our Facebook page, or Twitter.