Composting.....Why Do I do It?

It was a beautiful spring day so I spent several hours on an annual event; emptying one of my compost bins that had been “cooking” for the past year.  The dark, rich, humus soil that results from composting is a reward for the gardener and a natural fertilizer for plants.  Composting is nature’s way of recycling and goes on 24/7 in the natural world.  However, on our one acre subdivision lot, composting takes planning and requires some physical effort.

 As I dug and sifted the compost pile, the sweat began popping out on my forehead and I wondered to myself, “How many people do this anymore?”  “Why do I do this?”  “This is a lot of back-breaking work.”

Now I’ll have to admit that I am basically a lazy composter and use the low temperature method which relies on Psychrophiles, low temperature microbes, to breakdown the plant materials placed in the compost bin.  Some gardeners, who need faster results, use the “hot method” which breaks down the compost more quickly.  But I’ve got time, so I’m willing to wait a year or so and let the little microbes do their job.  The end results are the same for either method; a rich, dark, humus soil.

 Later that day with the composting task behind me, I pondered my own self-imposed question of “Why do I do this?”   Sitting at the computer I jotted down several thoughts about composting and what it is that keeps me “doing it” year after year.

For starters, it is a practical thing to do because the compost bin is basically a dump.  It gives me a place to dispose of the leaves, stems, twigs, vines, grass and other vegetative matter that is generated by our one acre lot.  As garden crops are harvested during the summer there’s always plenty of non-eatable plant matter that must be disposed of in some way.  Our flowering plants provide their season of color and beauty, but then must be deadheaded and thinned.  And much too every gardener’s regret there are always plenty of weeds to pull, providing additional green matter for the compost bin.   

The beginnings of a new compost pile. 

Another reason to compost comes from my life-long love of things natural.  I’ve always enjoyed trees, plants and animals and appreciated the life cycles found in the natural world.  The deep humus soil of a mature forest bears a wonderful testimony to how nature recycles the leaf and stem litter deposited by the trees.  Seemingly simple and yet complex is the cycle whereby  microscopic organisms decay the plant materials, then insects and earth worms further refine those particles into the rich soils of the forest floor.  This continuous cycle of decay and soil rebuilding nourishes the older trees and provide fertile ground for new sprouts to take root.  As a composting-gardener, it is an amazing process to facilitate right here on our small subdivision lot.

A third reason is that composting brings a certain sense of fulfillment and oneness with nature.  It lets me be a participant in the plant world’s natural process of living, growing, flowering, dying, and decaying.  This natural cycle provides nourishment and re-birth to new plants in a never ending cycle of life.  In a world where we are so often detached and removed from nature, what a pleasure it is to be a participant in this natural process.

What it looks like after about a year of slow cooking.

As a final thought, composting reminds me that like the plants, I am time-limited, flourishing for just a season.  I have a time to live, flower and produce good fruit; then a time to die and decay.  Back before our culture evolved to the point of burials in concrete and metal vaults, a deceased person’s body was simply placed in the ground or buried in a wooden box; allowed to return to the earth and become a part of a life-giving cycle.  Perhaps in our contemporary culture we’ve lost a real sense of what we really are; just another part of the circle of life.  We’ve forgotten where we came from, remember Geneses 2:7… “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground.”  Maybe that’s why for me at least, there is a humbling revelation that comes when I turn the compost pile each year.

 

The handfull of compost and I have much in common.