Composting

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My late grandmother, who was raised on a farm, is my inspiration for a lot of my gardening efforts. One of the things she taught me was composting. On the opposite side of the path from her garden she had a compost operation setup. It was built of 2x4 posts and corrugated sheet metal and consisted of three adjoining stalls, each with three sides, all with no roof. While preparing meals and cleaning up afterward, my grandmother taught us to divide scraps into fruit, vegetables and eggshells for the compost pile, things that could be given to the fish in the lake, stuff to share with the dogs on the porch and garbage. When our family teamed up to rake her yard, we composted leaves and ran branches through a chipping machine then added that in, too, as well as setting some aside for mulch. In addition, there were times that she took me with her to pickup some cow chips (manure) from her sister's barn. Periodically, my grandmother asked me to get a rake and help her turn over the piles in the compost chambers by her garden. Now I understand that this allowed the bottom layers to become exposed to the sun to aid decomposition. At planting time, my grandmother would add compost to the soil in her garden, then side dress the plants occasionally during the growing process. My grandmother really knew how to compost. Her always-full pantry, deep freeze and basement storage areas were proof of that.