Composting Tips From the Newbie

Where can you get an apricot muffin, gourmet spice mixtures, handmade taco, ginger roll, fresh cut sunflowers and greens for your compost bin?

THE FARMERS MARKET !!!!!!

Skip the food, this post is about compost and more specifically compost yard greens.  Compost yard greens can include flowers, vegetables, plant trimmings hedge clippings and most commonly used grass clippings. If you use the mulching feature when mowing your lawn and don't have any other regular supply of yard greens you may not be able to produce enough greens from yard cleanup to add to your compost pile.

Never fear, your local Farmer's Market can help. They have the best yard greens.  Why? Because many customers request to have the tops of root vegetables such as beets and carrots, removed during the purchase.  These greens get thrown into a bucket, pail or box and are discarded at the end of the day as trash.  The vendors are happy to pass along these greens just for the asking.
Now if the township were to get in on the action, maybe we could provide the Farmer's Market vendors a designated area or bin where they could discard these greens, the town could collect these greens along with the regularly scheduled recycle pickup, add the greens to the recycled leaves which are already being collected every week and produce even more FREE compost for the township. Hmmmmmmm............

Another way to supplement your lack of greens is to ask a neighbor who doesn't mulch grass clippings, to save some for you.  How do you know if your neighbor doesn't mulch the grass clippings?  Are they setting out lawn and leaf bags on recyclable day after mowing the lawn? Or you could do what I do and just ask the neighbor.  Be careful with this option, you don't want grass clippings from a lawn that has been chemically treated.  So you might want to pay a bit of attention if you see your neighbor adding amendments to their lawn and/or if you have a good relationship with them, ask about their lawn treatments and tell them why you want to know.

This is my first year composting and I am anxiously awaitng my pile of Black Gold.