Plant Your Trash

I am the first to admit that I love free food. It's one of the chief reasons that I garden - I can make a salad with no exchange of money. What's even better than paying for garden seeds is getting these for free too. Most of us toss viable plant starts into the trash or compost bin regularly.

Alex captured me rescuing a pineapple top from my parent's trash. Settle a pineapple in a container filled with soil and it will sprout roots and continue to grow. I have kept pineapples as house plants for years and have yet to coax one to fruit, but others report it is possible.

Ever found a garlic clove that is sprouted? Chefs reject these because the garlic itself can be bitter. Pop that sprouted garlic in soil (indoors or out) and the greens will grow. Viola! Garlic chives!

Whereas most fruit pits do nothing in the soil, an avocado pit will sprout a thick stem and long green leaves in a container. The plant will not fruit without a graft of a producing tree, but an avocado makes a great house plant.

My latest experiment in compost gardening is celery. I planted the base of a store-bought celery stalk approximately 2 inches under the soil in one of our outdoor raised beds. Guess what started peaking through this week? Celery leaves! Even if the plant doesn't produce thick stalks, I know the leaves will be tasty in soup or salad.

Obviously, traditional garden plants that produce well will be grown from quality seeds. But if you have a little extra soil, it can't hurt to grow some unusual plants for free from your food waste!

I am this month's Once A Month Mom Get Real guest blogger and my first post - Edible Gardening Basics - is up. I hope you will read and follow the discussion!

Dsolv Bags

There's a new green company in town. Dsolv Bags, based out of Columbus Ohio, makes compost friendly lawn waste bags. They offered me a starter set to test during my fall leaf cleanup.

I opened the starter set carrying case to find a collapsible funnel, 8 polymer mesh dsolv bags and a bag handle.

On the first try, I ripped one of the dsolv bags trying to fit it around the funnel/sleeve. Oops. Once I got the hang of it I expanded the funnel inside the bag and began filling with leaves. I experienced no ripping from then on.

The bags hold more leaves than a standard paper leaf bag and were far easier to fill. Once the bag was full, I slipped out the sleeve and tied the top. I didn't need the handle to drag the full bag through our tiny front yard but I could see it being useful if I was hauling greater distances.

Rain caused an early end to my dsolv testing session. I was able to fit the funnel and extra bags into the carrying case in a few minutes flat.

I did not test whether the bags decompose in my home compost bin. Their product information states the bags break down in six months under ideal conditions. I've already established that my compost bin is NOT ideal, so I'll stick with dumping in layers of leaves sans bags and leaving the dsolv bags for yard waste pickup service.

I was a little concerned that the leaf pickup workers would not recognize the bags, but they collected them without any hesitation.

I admit that my usual leaf raking habit is to work a little at a time and fill up my two forever reusable yard waste trash cans weekly. There are times of the year, though, when I do a big yard cleanup and use a few paper leaf bags. Now that I have the dsolv starter system ($19.99), I will buy refills ($6.99 for 8 bags) because they are easier to use, bigger than standard bags, and compact to store. Dsolv bags are currently available in limited retail locations and online with plans to expand into wider markets next spring.

Disclosure: Dsolv gave me a starter set. My opinions are my own.

Potato Growing in the Compost Bin

When we had some red potatos sprouting in kitchen recently, Alex tucked them carefully in the corners of our backyard compost bin.

They are now over a foot tall.  It used to be pretty shady back there but American Electric Power recently hacked away some tree branches and the plants may get more sun than before.

I see no reason to disturb the tubers.  Having something rooted gives us another excuse to be lazy composters and not turn the bin this summer.  When the leaves go brown, we'll dig around and see if there are any spuds to harvest.

Last year we had an abundance of volunteer tomatoes and sunflowers but they seem to have not reseeded so well this year. Do you have any volunteers making their home in your yard?

Composting the Hound Way

A friend asked on twitter recently if I had anything written about compost.  I have not and there's a good reason why: I am a lazy composter.

It's not that I don't love composting; I do.  I just don't measure temperature or output or anything like others who have composting down to a science.

My composting goal is to have a place to get rid of my food scraps and leaves without giving them to the city.  When it ends up as 'black gold' soil, that's just a bonus.

If you want to learn about how to compost the right way, read something else. ;)

Here's how we do it:

1) Build a compost bin.  Alex built ours from 2x4 posts and fence sections assembled with decking screws.  Tumbling composters do a better job at keeping the temperature up to make soil faster but they cost more.

2) Collect scraps.  For awhile we used a ceramic crock until I broke the lid.  Then we used a stainless steel flour can until that developed a hairline leak.  Right now we have an old plastic canister that holds our scraps next to the sink.  My Open Sky shop has a nice kit of composting accessories in it that includes a countertop collection bin and a cute bamboo bin.

Most composting guides will tell you to add only vegetable matter and eggshells to the compost.  If you aren't bothered by flies and waiting longer, meat and dairy will compost too.  We do not wish to bug the neighbors so we trash meat and dairy.

3) Dump scraps.  Real composters will tell you about layering x amount of brown matter with scraps and x amount of green matter.  We just toss what we have when we have it.  We keep fall leaves in a trash can next to the compost bin and add those if the bin is attracting flies.

4) Turn.  This is where the true laziness is apparent.  I never turn the compost bin.  Alex does once or twice a year with a pitchfork.  Sometimes a rat or mouse lives in there and tunnels through, doing some of the digging for us.  Real composters will advise turning much more often to maintain heat and lower scrap size.

5) Reap the soil.  Our bin does not produce compost very quickly.  Go figure.  When we do want to get some of the good stuff, we open the hatch and dig out from the bottom.

I hope I didn't lose all my gardening credibility today.  Do you compost? How?

By the way, worm composting is another way to go, one which I have even less experience. My friends at One20 Farm have a site devoted to the supplies and knowhow you need to enter the world of vermicomposting.

First Gardening of 2009!

The weather was springlike today!   We took a trip to Oakland Park nursery to buy seeds.   (They are 33% off right now, local friends!)  By afternoon we had gardening fever and just couldn't wait to get our hands in the dirt. Alex dug out some compost from the bottom of our bin to mix with potting soil so we could start our tomato, pepper, and herb seeds.  He decided that maybe we should move the compost bin today, since the weather was nice and there wasn't much else to do.

The rest of the good compost was dumped into a bed.  Lil and I mixed it around some while Alex moved the compost bin to the other side of the beech tree beyond our back fence.

Here's the new view of the compost bin.

I'm thrilled that the dogs won't be able to get in the bin.  Better yet, we won't smell it during the dog days of summer.

We confirmed in the moving of the bin that we aren't very efficient composters.  We don't really pay attention to layering or cutting things in small pieces.  But it is good enough for us.  We are satisfied knowing that our yard waste and food scraps are not going into a landfill and we can occaisionally get good soil from the bottom.