Making a compost pile is similar to making a huge layer cake! Well, not precisely but you will,in a little while, see what I mean.But first, a few terms about the aggregate of brown (carbon) material, against green (nitrogen) substance to put into your compost bin. Toting up too much brown substance will result in a pile that takes a long period to go down into considerable pieces whereas too much green material will result in a greasy, stinking pile that doesn’t break out successfully. In order for our pile to break down quickly and efficiently we need to provide just the right balance of brown and green materials.

The bacteria in our compost bins need mutually carbon and nitrogen to flourish; carbon is for vigour and nitrogen for protein synthesis. For every one element of nitrogen used by the bacteria they also munch about 30 units of carbon. And so as to keep the bacteria functioning competently we need to generate an environment for them that is roughly 30 parts carbon to 1 part nitrogen.

Unfortunately, a good number of the composting materials don’t have a carbon to nitrogen (C:N) proportion of 30:1. However, if we know the estimated C:N ratio of the materials we use in our compost pile, we can syndicate them so that the total concoction will be as near as likely to 30:1. This may appear a bit complex but it really isn’t.

Begin with a 4 inch coating of brush, branches, grass or straw at the bottom of the compost bin. If you don’t have these resources, dry greeneries will do. This first layer should be as rough as possible to permit air to be dragged up into the pile from the bottommost of the bin.

Then add a 4 inch layer of brown matter, then a thin casing of completed compost or good plot soil. That’s one coating. The totalling of compost or soil is to deliver the necessary microorganisms to get the compost to begin breaking down. If we don’t add this coating the compost will even work, the addition just helps to hurry things along.Then add another 4 inch layer of the green materials. After that, carry on adding materials in inter changing layers of greens and browns until the compost bin is fully occupied. See that this task of compost production is as easy as saying the alphabet.