Composting and Happy Worms

First we start with the 4'x4'x6" box located directly under the kitchen window, makes it very easy to throw out compost scraps. we put down a bed of brown grass or leaves. I cut two picket fence boards in half, and nailed the ends together, I reinforced them with concrete blocks, but they actually hold up really well, they are now 2 years old.

We have a pitch fork to turn everything over every other week so that it gets covered and and does not stink, there are tiny flies occasionally.

• It takes much much longer for pineapples to compost than banana skins.
• Egg shells last a long time, but eventually they break down too.
• whole fruits and veggies take longer than when they are cut up.
• Onions, Potato peel, and lettuce leaves go really really fast.
• I found an avocado seed that started to split, I wonder if it will sprout?

Our compost pile started in August at the beginning of the school year, we have moved it over from the kitchen window twice now, we have accumulated from just kitchen and yard waste, a 8 ft x 8 ft x 6 in pile of pure humus, it is now completely ready to start the first garden project. I used four picket fence boards, just nailed them together, set them on the ground, and filled with the compost from the small box.

we estimate that our compost weighed 100 lbs per wagon load. It took three trips with the wagon in November, and another three trips in March to move all of the compost, that is 600 lbs of waste that is now going to be a very good garden.

At one point this winter all the seeds from a squash germinated and there were lots of baby squashes growing, but the freeze in December killed them.