The compost experiment
In my efforts to lower my greenhouse gas and consumption footprint, I have decided that I am going look at food differently. Fast foods, prepared foods, processed foods are all out the window now for the sole reason that I am perfectly capable of buying local and doing things like peeling the potatoes and carrots, seasoning the fish, making my own fruit salad and sandwiches. It also means that I delete massive amounts of plastic packaging, energy consuming mass processing, shipping from all corners of the globe and waste. As a result, I have more compostable material and given the fact that vegetable and fruit peelings and ends accumulate quickly I have the opportunity to experiment.
I feel kind of silly hauling my waste scraps to the green bin and then having them trucked them off to some site for composting. In the old days, when I was a boy, we had a compost pile, in behind the garden, where all the peelings and vegie matter wound up. Whenever we dumped a bin of scraps on to the pile we were sure to cover them with soil to keep the inevitable scavengers at bay. We lived in the country so we had a big garden and everything, especially during the summer came from that garden. The preserve making ritual in the fall was a sight and kept us going through the winter. It was spectacular and for the life of me it doesn’t compare to what the supermarket has to offer…but more on that another time.
It is the compost that I want focus on. I don’t live on the farm anymore so I have to make a bit of effort to get the same result. I have decided that I will compost my own plant material with an indoor worm compost. I went on line, and I have to admit that the on line resources on just about anything are spectacular, and downloaded a number of site with instruction on what to do. All you need are a couple of large bins, one deep with a lid a shaded cool place and worms, lotsa worms! Apparently they can munch through a week’s worth of vegie and fruit cast-offs in a week and produce the best soil and compost you could imagine. Its simple, clean and efficient. And what’s better is that I get to elevate my “holier than thou” approach to life another notch!
Now that is the theory. The bins have been set up. I have chosen the location and now its just getting the worms, thousands of them, to munch through my waste and having the diligence to take their product to my garden. I promise to keep you apprised on the project. My wife and I wonder about things like smell, loose worms, dying worms and really how fast we can process all the vegie matter.
It will be fun and it will interesting. If all else fails and they don’t work out, you can catch me fishing. After all I do have the worms!