Compost Guidelines The following "compost" guidelines were extracted from the book "Gaia's Garden" 1. The best role of compost is to provide a quick fertility boost. 2. Gardens (farms) over a 100 square feet should begin considering other options. 3. Spade compost lightly into the surface and avoid excessive soil disturbance. 4. Compost should be viewed as a combination of "life" and "nutrients". This implies minimum disturbance to allow webs to develop. 5. Turning compost piles speeds the digestion of resources and not turning favors organisms who do not need oxygen. Overall it is best to design for two compost pile disturbances. jeff's notes: I tend to over fertilizer with compost because we have a large supply. This helps the soil retain water but it is more work. One argument i hear often is that hot compost piles destroy unwanted pathogens and seeds. I assume this is needed in some cases but my approach is to fill them with seedy material and ignore the heating requirement. The few seeds that sprout are covered with mulch and those poor pathogens have to battle it out with the good guys. So far it has all worked out. I tend to use mulch on the surface for a year then collect it and put it in the compost pile. This gives me two years of service from most biomass.
