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You've created a finished batch of compost. Congratulations! Many gardeners would love to have the rich compost that is now ready to go on your garden. But as you sit there, shovel in hand, you may wonder about the best way to apply your compost. Do you put it on top of the garden soil, mix it in, or apply it in a specific area of the garden? Using Compost to Prepare Garden Beds Compost is the ideal soil to place in garden beds to prepare them for their first use or to get them ready in the spring. After a long winter, garden beds may be compacted and poorly-drained. They need an infusion of micro-organisms, nutrients, and lighter soil to create good conditions for plants to grow. This is where compost comes in. It's full of nutrients and microbes. Dig it into the garden as a soil amendment or fertilizer. Using Compost as a Side Dressing When plants are just starting to grow, you don't want to disturb the soil underneath them. This is when side-dressing is necessary. Spread a thin layer of compost around growing plants to provide new nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. Some people do this once a month during the growing season, while other gardeners do it once a year as the new plants begin to grow. Using Compost as a Mulch Compost can also be used to protect the soil in the fall and winter or to prevent it from drying out in the summer. Spread compost on top of existing soil to keep the moisture in the soil and to add a nutritious mulch along the top of the garden bed. Creating Compost Tea With Compost While many people think that compost tea is the wet material that comes from your compost, true compost tea is made by steeping a bag of compost in a bucket for a few days with an aquarium bubbler. This helps to ensure that the material is full of aerobic bacteria. Spread compost tea under plants that need a little help, or spray it onto plants as a natural pest control. Strategic Placement of Compost: Vegetable Gardens and Lawns Some parts of the garden are heavy feeders, in need of microorganisms, nutrients, and trace minerals. Lawns can be hard to grow in some climates, and often gardeners use a lot of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides on a lawn. Compost can change this. Adding a light layer of compost as a lawn dressing can fertilize the lawn and make it less susceptible to disease. Combined with other natural lawn care techniques like leaving the grass a little longer and keeping grass clippings on the lawn, composting can help reduce the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. Since we get nutrients from the produce that we grow in the vegetable garden, it is also particularly important to ensure that our vegetable garden is well-stocked with trace minerals and fertilizer nutrients. Use compost as a fertilizer in the garden or use it as a side dressing as the plants grow to produce healthy vegetables and fruits.
Lars Handley is a master composter based in Dallas, Texas. Want to learn more? Visit his Compost Instructions site to learn every aspect of making compost. Dont miss the How to Compost in every season page where you can ask a question and get a personal response.
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