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The school bell is ringing, football Sundays are back and yellowing leaves are slowly beginning to accumulate on the lawns of Boston homeowners. Fall. It’s fast approaching and there is nothing we can do about it except…. COMPOST!  New England weather is perfect for composting and now is the perfect time to start! Involve your kids, go “green”, save money and have the garden or flowerboxes that all your neighbors will envy.

Why compost?  Most importantly, compost because it is EASY and it just makes sense!

It saves you money, uses natural resources, which helps to protect our environment and will make you look like a master gardener whether you have just a few window boxes, or a massive vegetable garden.

You don’t have to live on acres of land in Sudbury or Lexington, or raise your own chickens in Plympton, to compost; in fact, you can successfully compost whether you live in a condo in South Boston, a large single family home in Brookline. You can live anywhere in the Greater Boston area, all you need is a patch of outdoor space large enough for a trash barrel. Composting is low maintenance, free and can save you heaps of money on landscaping and garbage pick up. 

Here is what you need to get started. Compost requires only sunlight, water and periodic churning.  Remarkably enough, if properly tended to, it doesn’t even stink!  You will need a compost barrel, (these can be found at places like home depot or sites like craigslist.org used) or they can be made out of nearly any heavy duty trash barrel and a lid with plenty of small holes to let in light (small enough not to leak out composting materials).  If you make your own barrel and it is not self-turning, you will need a pitchfork to periodically incorporate composting material. 

What are the best compost materials? There are no magic tricks involved in transforming leftover dinner into rich and fertile soil, just a bit of science and preparation.  There are two basic types of compostable material: carbon and nitrogen.  Or, more simply, brown (dry) and green (damp) matter, respectively. Perhaps the best sources of brown matter are leaves and grass trimmings.  As long as it is damp and the browns are mixing with the greens, you are creating garden gold.  You can save nearly all kitchen scraps (though most agree that meat gets smelly and might attract critters…) such as coffee grinds, fruit cores/seeds/pits, moldy or stale bread, pasta, kids sandwich crusts, etc.  in a sealable bucket in the kitchen and empty it into the compost bin as needed. Involve your children by letting them choose what leftovers to add each night and have them churn the materials each week. Involving your children is a great way to introduce them to a “green” project and they will love seeing the rich brown soil they helped to create!

You are now not only saving money by reducing the cost for the removal of yard and household trash, but come spring, your savings on fertilizer and soil will be eliminated, leaving you room to maybe buy a few flowers or seeds you couldn’t afford last season!

*For more info on composting specifics and local projects, see www.howtocompost.org.

 Go Pats!