Wildlife garden
Composting: from kitchen and garden waste to rich dark soil
To make good compost, mix green and brown material, such as vegetable scraps and grass with leaves, straw and small twigs, keep the heap moist but not wet and turn it now and then; after six to twelve months you have dark, crumbly compost.
What to do
- Choose a spot in partial shade, on bare soil rather than paving, so that worms and other soil life can get in; a bin or a slatted silo keeps it tidy.
- Mix green and brown, roughly half and half: vegetable scraps, coffee grounds, grass clippings and spent plants with leaves, straw, cardboard and small prunings. A layer of nettle or comfrey leaves gets things going.
- Keep the heap as moist as a wrung-out sponge: water it in dry summers, and cover it in heavy rain with a lid, cardboard or an old hessian sack.
- Turn the heap every one to two months with a fork, or make two or three bins side by side and move it across each time: this lets air in and speeds things up.
- After six to twelve months the compost is dark and crumbly and smells like woodland soil: sieve it and spread a layer of 1–2 cm over your borders and vegetable patch in spring.
- Before you turn or move the heap, check first that no hedgehog is sleeping in it, especially from November to March.
Caution: Do not put meat, fish, dairy, cooked leftovers or cat and dog droppings on the compost heap: they attract rats or spread disease. Diseased plants and weeds with ripe seed do not belong there either.
Why it helps
- Compost feeds the life in the soil and makes it looser: sandy soil holds water better, and heavy clay drains better.
- A compost heap is a little piece of nature in itself: earthworms, woodlice, millipedes and beetles break down the waste, and hedgehogs and slow-worms find warmth, food or a place to spend the winter there.
- You buy less potting compost and fertiliser, and less waste goes in the bin.
Which plants?
- Common comfrey Symphytum officinale herb · flowers May–July NativePoisonous
- Common nettle Urtica dioica herbaceous plant Native
- Yarrow Achillea millefolium herbaceous plant Native
- Elder Sambucus nigra Shrub · flowers May–June Native
- Hazel Corylus avellana Shrub · flowers January–March Native
When?
March–November.
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Take up the challenge
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Leave the leaves (October–November)
Leave leaves under shrubs or make a leaf pile: a winter shelter for hedgehogs and insects.
Did you know? A handful of good compost holds more bacteria and fungi than there are people on Earth.