Compost is the simplest way to turn garden and kitchen waste into soil. A heap works with three things: a mix of green and brown material, air, and moisture.
Greens are grass clippings, vegetable peelings and coffee grounds; they bring nitrogen. Browns are leaves, cardboard and straw; they bring carbon and keep the heap open so air gets in.
Keep meat, dairy and cooked food out, and avoid diseased plants and weeds with seeds. Everything else from the garden can go in, chopped small so it breaks down faster.
Turn the heap every few weeks and keep it as damp as a wrung-out sponge. A warm heap in summer is ready in two to three months; a cold heap takes most of a year.
Finished compost is dark, crumbly and smells of forest floor. Spread it on beds in spring, or use it in pots mixed with sand and garden soil.
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