Preparing Your Compost for Your Winter Garden

Composting can help warm your garden in the winter months. The bio-heat that is created as they decompose generates a significant amount of heat, up to 160 degrees, if you have a nice moist and active pile of compost. The general rule of composting is Green + Brown = Gold! Let’s dive into what that means.

The ideal 6 month recipe for compost is:

1. 30 parts carbon (leaves, sawdust, paper, straw)
2. 1 part nitrogen (grass, manure, kitchen scraps)

It’s a pretty high carbon to nitrogen ratio. This is simply by volume so for example if I have I cup kitchen scraps I will need essentially 30 cups of dry leaves or other high volume – low weight/density things that you would mix in.

Keep the pile wet like a sponge and as you turn it, it will heat back up again. So, you will turn it, wet it, turn it. If you put this on the edges of your garden where you can’t really grow things anyways, it will heat the soil to help keep the garden warm.

If you know somebody that has an amazing compost pile you might want to ask them if you can buy a shovel full from them. Put it in a Ziplock back, bring it to your compost and mix it in. It will help your compost move along much faster.

Want to learn even more about composting or seasonal gardening? Get into the Agriscaping Mastery Program today!