The four essential requirements of a healthy heap

Like any living thing your compost bin needs food, moisture, warmth and air. It is a living system and if you don’t look after the bugs that help make compost, they can’t do the job.

1. The right ingredients

Food comes from the materials that you put into your compost bin. Like us, a compost bin needs a balanced diet with a wide range of different ingredients. This includes green materials (wet soggy stuff) rich in nitrogen and brown materials (dry stuff) rich in carbon.
Greens are soft, sappy materials with a high water content such as vegetable peelings, grass clippings, teabags, nettles and freshly dug weeds.
Browns are dry, fibrous materials such as twigs, paper, cardboard, loo rolls, egg boxes, sawdust and straw.

2. Warmth

Warmth is provided by the sun and during hot weather the composting process speeds up. In the Hebrides composting can take two to three years to properly rot down, where as in some areas of Africa it can take two to three months provided there is enough moisture. Clearly the weather in Wiltshire is out of our control, however if you can position your compost bin in a sunny position it will compost faster than if it is placed in the shade.

3. Moisture

Moisture in a compost bin comes from the soft sappy materials that tend to be green in colour and include grass cuttings, weeds, fruit and vegetable peelings. However, to prevent these ingredients rotting down into a slimy, smelly mush, materials need to be mixed into them that provide air pockets.

4. Air

Ingredients that have structure provide the air; they tend to be brown in colour and include hedge trimmings and other woody waste, plus paper and cardboard. Remember to mix the green and brown ingredients up before they go in the bin - then you don’t need to worry about turning your compost o provide enough air.