Compost Awareness Week - Air

Today's Compost Awareness Week's video is about AIR! Did you know that stuff needs air to properly break down and not produce methane? Which is a gas worse for the climate than carbon dioxide!

So I made this video showing you how I add air to my two backyard bins.

 
Compost Tips - Adding Air from Lisa Kercher on Vimeo.

Send me your comments or questions. I could talk about compost all day every day.
I just love it so much!

xo
Lis

FURTHER READING

Check out the other video in this "series" explaining BROWNS.

VIDEO TEXT

One of the reasons we love compost so much over the landfill for your food scraps and your leaves is because when things go to the landfill they don't actually break down. Because landfills usually are covered over and so there's no air in there to help stuff actually decompose, especially the things that would normally just decompose if they were you know...out. So, composts are great because...I don't know. The stuff decomposes, it doesn’t release methane, etc. There are lots of reasons! Let's get into giving our compost air today/ Because they need air to work. 

Okay so the next minute (of the video) is me working in my compost bins. I have a handy pitchfork that I used to stab down in there to get through as many layers as I can, and just work some are down into there. I'm also trying to break up some of the bigger chunks (of material) especially the big wet ones while I'm down there. Because that will of course help it break down more.

I'm also watching for my balance between browns and greens. You'll notice me adding more leaves from my leaf bin as I go because again I've been adding food scraps from my kitchen all winter and not a lot of leaves so these bins definitely need a little balancing.

That gives you a little bit of an idea of how I add air to my compost bins. It takes a bit of time because I don't have a type of bin where I'm easily going to take out all of the material, turn it properly and put it back in and add more carbon - browns - to it but I do my best with what I have. And I'm not super worried about the amount of finished compost I'm going to get out of my bins every year. I do it more to divert food scraps and leaves and yard waste from the landfill and to supplement my garden soil every year.

There are certain types of compost bins that you can buy at home stores like these but that make turning in your compost a little bit easier. This is what I have and it works for me! Another way that you can easily add air to your compost is by adding some bigger sticks. They're not going to break down as fast obviously as other things in your compost bin, but it adds some breathing room and space into your compost. So it gives it that air without you having to do much work!

But that wasn't much work. And it's kind of fun to be outside, and listen to the birds, and mess around in my yard for a little bit!

If you have any questions about simple composting hit me up I'm always ready to talk about composting forever. It's my favourite. I think that's it.