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YOUR OWN COMPOST
Instead of sending organic materials to landfills, compost your yard clippings and use the mulch to improve your garden by adding organic material to your soil, increasing its ability to hold water. Composting is the breakdown of organic material by fungi and bacteria. The process of composting builds heat, which destroys weed seed, insects and disease. In the High Desert, this normal heat build-up combined with high temperatures can result in fire. Keep compost piles away from structures. What can you compost? Good compost can include any organic material such as grass clippings, weeds, tree leaves, livestock manures, hedge clippings, straw, and vegetable wastes from the kitchen. What should you avoid? Do not compost greasy materials such as meats, fish, bones, or plastic and foil. Also avoid using Oleander, Palo Verde, Eucalyptus, and Salt Cedar leaves. Wood chips will decompose very slowly while succulent material will break down relatively quickly.
Steps: 1. Stack compost material four to six feet high. Keep in place with wire or wood. 2. Turn the compost pile every month to even the decomposing process. 3. Moisten the pile as needed to keep as wet as a squeezed out sponge. 4. Add a handful of high nitrogen fertilizer with every large amount of organic matter added. 5. Composting will be complete in six weeks to six months, depending upon heat and the size of the materials. 6. Place the composted material on the soil surface around plants, or mix into new planting areas and backfill soils. It is especially good to use in flowerbeds, soil mixes, or with container plants and vegetables.
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