Compost is one of nature’s best mulches and soil amendments. Quality garden compost can be made easily and freely in the backyard, and it saves on the cost of fertilizers.

Quality Garden Compost

Almost any organic material can be used for the compost pile, however, since most backyard compost heaps or bins are not able to attain a temperature high enough to kill all pathogens or deter vermin, some materials should be excluded. Caution should therefore be exercised when selecting organic materials for composting. In most cases pet faeces, non vegetarian animal manure, meat scraps, and dairy products are not suitable for garden composting.


For proper composting the compost pile also needs the right mixture of carbon rich “brown matter” and nitrogen rich “green matter”. Brown matter can consist of such items as dried leaves, straw, sawdust, wood chips, and even non-inked paper and cardboard. Green matter can include green plant material such as grass clippings, fresh cut hay, weeds, animal manures, fruit and vegetable table scraps, seaweed’s, and coffee grounds.

Garden Composting

The speed of composting is proportional to the amount of human efforts putting into creating the compost. Passive composting takes the least amount of human effort. Simply locate a convenient spot in the garden, build a 3 to 4 foot square base and holding walls, fill it with leaves and garden wastes, sprinkle it with water and let Mother Nature do the rest. The material to be composted will eventually be fully broken down within a year or two.

There is no need to turn the pile, check its temperature, add activators, manures, or anything else. In contrast, active human interventions would produce garden compost in as short a period as one month. Composting time decreases if the materials are chopped up as shredding greatly increases the total surface area of organic materials, allowing greater access by microorganisms and faster decomposition.

Heat For Composting

With the right mix of carbon and nitrogen rich materials, the temperature in the interior of the pile will rapidly rise to 110 to 140 degrees. Heat is an important factor in effective composting. Hot composting allows aerobic bacteria to thrive. The ideal condition is for pasteurization to occur in hot compost at a temperature around 55 Celsius (131 F) or more for three or more days. This will kill most pathogens and seeds.