Great tips to ensure you don’t ‘fall’ behind with your composting this autumn

Many of us are missing a trick if we don’t continue to use our compost bin through the colder months as well as during the spring and summer. Adding waste through the cooler weather helps to keep the composting momentum going at a time when decomposition will naturally slow down.

Home composting is easy to do all year round; here are some great tips to ensure we keep a good thing going by not overlooking our compost bin or heap during these cooler, darker months:

• Help next years’ plants grow by making use of this year’s tired vegetation. Adding spent bedding plants to your compost mix will help to capture all the nutrients and will give your new plants a great start when you wake the garden back up in the spring.

• Bring the inside, outside! Half of all our household waste can be composted at home. Anything from loo roll tubes and egg boxes to coffee grounds and tea leaves are all welcome additions to your compost bin.

• Make your compost mixture more a-peel-ing. Don’t forget to regularly add your kitchen waste to your compost. It will really appreciate the peelings from your tasty winter vegetables.

• Give your mix a Christmas present! Many of us will have extra waste over the festive period. Your compost mix will benefit from adding a few of the telltale signs of Christmas; fallen poinsettia leaves, scrunched up wrapping paper, Satsuma peel and egg shells will all be welcome winter additions.

While there are lots of things you can keep adding to your compost, try to avoid the temptation to overfill your compost bin with unwanted surplus fruit and vegetables.  If you only compost vegetable matter it can sometimes go a bit sludgy and wet, so you really need to mix in some drier material like shredded paper and cardboard to help get the mix right.  

For more information visit www.shropshire.getcomposting.com