Lately I’ve been thinking about things I can do to save time in the garden and I decided trench composting would be a great way to do this. I started composting directly in the garden areas that need the most help. Now I don’t have to worry about nutrients leaching from the compost pile, which is something I’ve been reading about. If your compost pile isn’t covered, the rain will leach nutrient from the compost into the soil below. Why let all that hard work get leached away? I started trench composting a couple months ago. My parents used to do this when I was growing up. It’s a quick and easy way to compost all that stuff from canning.
All you have to do is dig a trench in the garden area and add a layer of your compostable things. Then back fill with the soil you removed. By spring it will have turned become compost and the worms will have distributed it in the garden. No turning, no layering, it’s quick and easy! You can dig one long trench and simply fill along as you add the compost items.
I still have my regular compost pile for the large amounts of garden waste, but I’m thinking of starting to put this pile in the garden areas I need to amend, that way any nutrients that leach out with the rain will at least be going into a garden area I’ll be using in the future.
Do you practice various forms of composting?
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I’ve done quite a bit of trench composting on my site, as well as sheet mulching (which is essentially the same process, except that instead of digging in compost one layers up new beds above the soil line).
The unexpected benefit (?) has been volunteer veggies. One season, I had the “mystery squash” — a volunteer from what I’m guessing was some old butternut squash seeds in the trench. It didn’t taste as good as a first-generation squash, but it wasn’t terrible, and it was nice to have an added plant in the herbaceous layer of the garden – so we called it a win!
I’ve trenched composted before and it was really quick and easy. We’ve recently moved from country to town and bought a black plastic composter to put food scraps into. We have a spot for our garden next spring and hopefully will have some good soil worked in over the winter.
We live in town and so we use a black compost tumbler, that way we are not attracting animals or angering our neighbors. With canning, freezing, etc. that compost bin is full and we have another bin we have switched to so that the first can rest and finish composting, we will dump the contents from the resting compost bin in the garden this fall and work it in (along with some old manure).
Trench composting sounds interesting and would work in the fall after the garden is done and before the ground is frozen and covered in snow.
-Brenda
I had never heard of trench composting – it’s a great way to short-cut goodness into your garden soil. I’ll give it a try!
I have just started using this method on areas where I want to grow heavy feeders (like squash) next year. My soil is mostly gravel and rocks so it is really difficult to get and keep nutrients in it and squash in particular really suffers. I really believe there is NEVER enough compost, but I keep trying 😉
I’ve been spot composting in perennial beds by digging a hole about 12 inches down and burying chopped up veg and fruit scraps with some shattered egg shells. Just cover with the soil and let it break down. Very convenient around the perennials. Helps to break up my clay.
How do you know you’re not feeding the rats instead of the worms? In my urban area, that’s a problem. I can imagine that Bears might be a problem in some other places. Grinding is too much work, but might reduce the rat attacks if you have the right degree of wet. Where I am, in the desert, mummification has been a problem. My current, low labor but high capital solution for kitchen waste and weeds has been a compost tumbler I got at Costco for $100. So far, no more rat nests, and some pretty fast compost.
That’s one reason to bury it because it’s less likely to be found by opossums, raccoons, rats and other animals. Around here our main issue with compost piles is raccoons and opossums. If you bury it deep enough they won’t dig it up.
You could also try vermicomposting inside then you won’t have any trouble with animals.
I purchased a compost tumbler 6-7 years ago and I much prefer using a pile as I found the tumbler not very efficient (I have way too much compostable material backed up before the batch is finished).
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head, composting is an individual thing. You find out which method works for you and use that, there’s not one perfect way to suite all of our gardens & climates.
Just by digging into the soil the materials remaining at the end of the season is a way of returning the nutrients to the soil. The materials will decay as they do in other forms of composting. Other forms of composting will enable mixing the green and brown materials together in larger masses. This will speed up the composting of the brown materials and increase the heat of the composting mass.
Great Idea ~ I’ve been composting like that in a raised bed that I’m preparing for next spring , but I didn’t know it had a name (LOL).
~ Garden Blessings ~