Comments on: A Second Spring

By: Martha

Martha — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 00:51:57 +0000

I’m a little jealous! My fall veggies were a disaster

By: Wicked Gardener

Wicked Gardener — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 00:30:27 +0000

Hello – I’ve tagged you.

By: Caitlin

Caitlin — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 13:34:25 +0000

Well, that’s sort of what we did. But the Husband tried to tell me that we shouldn’t put too much dirt in there, and I deferred. Then we had a few mice. Anyway, he tells me now that he completely redid the thing a couple of weeks ago, and added layers of dirt. So we should be in better shape.

He must have been busy while I was knocked out on painkillers. Good man.

By: Stacy

Stacy — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 13:24:53 +0000

@Caitlin:

Let’s see…we started it with all the pruned rose bush branches, they sat out in the sun and dried while we were finishing the composter. On top of that went the spent dirt from about a dozen various-sized containers. Then the usual stuff…veg waste from the house, eggshells, coffee grounds and filters, a load of grass clippings, and everything I pulled out of the veg boxes over the summer. So yeah, need some dirt in there to get things cranking…it should be a layer of green (nitrogen), a layer of brown (carbon), a layer of green, etc. And “brown” can be sticks, woodchips, mulch or newspaper even. (Put brown on top of green to prevent stinky and flies.) We’ve had to spray ours down every so often too, the heat just sucks all the moisture out.

The stuff near the bottom is so black and rich looking. Can wait to use it in spring.

By: Caitlin

Caitlin — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 13:13:15 +0000

What did you use as compost “starter?” Ours isn’t really working that well this year, and my theory is that we didn’t have enough dirt in it for starter. But I really don’t know.