SFG FOUNDATION NEWSLETTER - AUGUST 2019

Hey Everyone!

Here's the latest SFGF Newsletter: AUGUST 2019

Finally got around to reading the newsletter, another good issue!   Found the link to the article "Make Your Own Compost" very interesting.  In the article it says to limit the amount of coffee grounds and/or sawdust to 10%. Curious why that would be?

I use pine pellets (compressed sawdust) for all of my compost as the "browns", and I typically have 30% to 40% coffee grounds in it. This has always produced very rich compost.  On a couple occasions I made a tumbler full of compost with nothing but coffee grounds and pine pellets, and it produced some of the best compost I've ever made.  Recently, though, a large percentage of the tumbler compost is vegetable pulp from a couple neighbors that do juicing and save all of the pulp for me - they used to put the pulp down the garbage disposal, what a waste! Pine pellets serve as the browns for the compost, and it is always more than 10%.

OhioGardener, diversity of ingredients is preached. Supposedly the more diverse, the better the compost but we only really know about 5% of the microbiology by name and haven't made a Law yet making it illegal to make compost that exceeds the percentages. I am going to start an indoor vermicompost experiment with nothing but shredded newspaper/cardboard, coffee grounds and my now world famous roasted, pulverized eggshells. I use the vermicompost in my seed germination mix but I was getting volunteers from the kitchen waste. It didn't cross my mind until I had tomato plants when I had sown pepper seeds. I don't think nature stops decomposition because the carbon to nitrogen ration is off or if the percentage of a component exceeds manufacturer's recommendations. Wait, you are the manufacturer.