Diamond House Compost
Here at Diamond House we are seriously into compost. Why throw away all that nutrient rich waste so it can either rot in a landfill or be sold by someone else as compost?
A healthy garden needs compost nutrients.
Mother nature does provide broken down matter or compost, however it is a long process: it takes about one thousand years for nature to create one inch of nutrient rich topsoil. As most of us don’t have that kind of time, composting is a great time saver.
We employ a variety of composting practices and processes here. Each has a different purpose, a couple are still a bit experimental, and all of them save a fortune in compost. If you want to know a bit more about what it takes to create a strong composting station, check out this article. It’s a more comprehensive list of things necessary for good compost and what to take into consideration when creating your own compost station. As a reminder, what we do here at Diamond House may not work for everybody, but we hope you are inspired to create your own version of these practices. Below are some of the systems we use. The links will take you to an outside page. (We do not get compensated for purchases from external links at this time.)
Worm composting. I love worm composting! It’s a relatively quick process, and in my opinion, the easiest to adjust to a variety of yard and garden sizes. Worm compost and worm tea, both byproducts of worm composting, are the most beneficial things to use in any garden. We have a relatively small system at this time, but might expand on it in the future. I keep it in a temperature controlled greenhouse year round, which keeps the worms fairly consistent when it comes to production. They can be fed weekly or bi-weekly, maybe longer if you plan to travel. Once established you can have compost every 3-4 weeks. The system I have is in the first link below, but this can also be done with plastic totes for very little cost. Worms do not come with the composter, but can be ordered from either of the websites in the links.
Worm Factory Composter - Amazon
Worm Factory Composter - Uncle Jim's Worm Farm
Commercial style composter. If you would like to have a larger, rodent proof composter, meet the Aerobin insulated composter. We have this one, but I will be honest, it’s a newer system and we are still experimenting with it. We chose this one because our temperatures can be below zero during the winter time and above a hundred during the summer time. Having consistent temperatures when composting is supposed to help it break down easier. That being said, ours has been a little slower than we would like. While this system gets great reviews from others, we are still working the kinks out with ours. It’s a great concept, we just haven’t gotten it figured out yet. We have a lot of rodents and wildlife, so we appreciated that there were no critters living in it over the winter. I’ll try to post an about as it progresses further.
Pet waste worm farm. Dog and cat waste and composting usually do not work. Dogs, cats, and other predominantly meat-eating pets create waste that have concentrated amounts of bacteria that can contaminate a standard compost station. That is where the Pet Waste Worm Farm comes in. We have 3 dogs, two of which are rather large and leave quite a few large meadow muffins around the yard for us to find. In an effort to create less of a carbon footprint, I started looking into ways of disposing our pet’s waste in a greener way. That’s when I found this beauty. As worms break down the waste the bacteria that would otherwise affect compost gets converted into useful nutrients. We use this system in a food forest area between trees. This will not be effective in an annual garden situation. However, trees and other permanent vegetation will enjoy this system. We have had this for over a year and it seems to work well in that area.
Traditional three-part compost system. As we have an acre, we have space to build some larger systems as well. Our three-part composting system is an exciting addition to me. This could be done on a smaller scale, but we chose to do it this wide so we could fit a dingo through the front of each station. The fourth space, (to the right), is for mulch from our yard. We made this simply out of 8x8x16 cinder block, and while we didn’t use cement, our ground is made of clay, so we used a mixture of clay and water to help bricks stay in place, which you can still see drying where the wet spots are. A quick Pinterest or internet search will show a variety of styles of three-part composters made from a variety of materials. You can go nuts with this one. The basics of this system are that you feed it, like you would any other system, one compartment at a time. Once that one is full, you move onto the next compartment and leave this first to break down. The idea here is that by the time the last one is about full, the first one is ready for use.
If I haven’t mentioned it before, we love to compost here, there are few better ways to add nutrients to your garden space than compost. Since we try to grow all our own produce, using the scraps of the food we nurtured all growing season and returning them to my garden creates a healthy cycle that reduces our carbon footprint, which is important to me.
Every yard can, and should, have a composting system of some kind. Whatever your yard situation is, you can compost. It’s great for your wallet, your yard and the environment. Do you have an unusual composting system in your yard? We would love to hear about it! Post in the comments below!
