After sifting last year’s compost to use for topping off pots, adding to roses, filling in where needed, I see the compost pile needs some oooomph to get back to balance. First I think I’ll take out the non-performers: I don’t think pineapple tops compost well, but then I wasn’t sure so I threw them in to find out. And avocado seeds, not so easily broken down but left alone some have rooted. Whole fruits take longer –try to cut and quarter at least, although I have some fallen citrus that just gets thrown in and eventually will break down. Occasionally cut flowers get thrown out in the compost and rose stems just take too long, I am constantly sifting them out and tossing them in a pile of branches, sticks and miscellaneous “stuff.”

So what next? (From my handy dandy Master Gardener’s Garden Companion) I need to balance GREEN nitrogen sources equally with BROWN carbon sources. Examples of GREEN are: coffee filters and grounds, crushed egg shells, tea bags, fruit and vegetable peelings, green grass clippings, herbivore droppings (chicken poop?) feathers, hair, wool. BROWN materials are: dry leaves, straw, and hay, sawdust, wood shavings, dry grass clippings, trimmings, shredded newspaper and documents, dryer lint. Read up on containers, boxes, theories if you want. Or just throw it out, turn it over, leave it if you will. After a while it will magically, marvelously become useable nutrients for a garden and you have kept something out of the endless trash pile we are making of our home planet. Even a little bit helps.

P.S. A net bag like ones the onions come in makes a great nesting materials source if you would rather put the hair and dryer lint, fabric trims and threads, etc out in a nearby tree near where birds nest in your yard!