Today is one of the first days I have had a chance to get into my home garden due to work and rain.. So i’m making the most of it and getting some compost ready for potting my seeds this season.
Home made compost is one of the best things you can do in a very small space at the back of the garden shed etc.. I have 2 dalek type bins plonked half under a huge fir hedge behind my greenhouse and they don’t get much sunlight at all. But they still make great compost. See my article on Composting here. I basically throw anything that can degrade into it and a year later its done. I hardly ever mix or turn it.
I don’t have much manoeuvring space so I have a short spade to dig the compost out of the bottom door, then into an old recycling bin and then taken to the potting shed where I sieve it with about a 6mm sieve. All the bigger pieces get thrown in a trench that I have dug alongside a trellis where I will grow some peas and runner beans for seed. I was given some Champion of England peas and some rare Trail of Tears runners so I will harvest seed this season from them without any cross pollination taking place at the plot.
Once I have sieved the compost I also sieve some bought general compost and I add a sprinkling of Blood Fish and Bone and mix it all up. This is now ready to go into my modules and pots for all my seeds to be sowed over the next few months.
I then cover it with a few plastic compost bags and then place an old carpet on top to keep it snug and out of the cold to be ready for my seeds.. The rest of the compost in the bins will be spread out over the whole flower garden in spring..
I use my mixture for sowing seeds and potting on. If I’m feeling a bit lazy I will sometimes get an assortment of bags of compost, mix them all up, add some of my own. No particular brand – to me compost is compost..
ps. Notice the carpeted shed (bits from skips) … ideal for winter work..
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