Summer is just around the corner and the long light evenings are finally here, which means there’s no better time to get back into the garden. Cardiff Council is marking International Compost Awareness Week, 2 – 6 May, by calling on residents to make the most of their garden and vegetable waste.
Creating your own compost couldn’t be easier, and it’s a brilliant way of turning waste into a resource. What could be greener for example than using vegetable peelings for compost to grow more vegetables? Compost bins are inexpensive and easy to find at most DIY stores, or you could build your own old-fashioned compost heap.
You can compost all sorts of garden waste, including twigs, leaves and grass cuttings, as well as fruit and vegetable peelings and even paper and card. Food waste which you can’t compost at home – such as cooked vegetables and meat – can still be disposed of sustainably by throwing them away in your food waste caddy so the council can collect it for large-scale composting or anaerobic digestion treatment.
In addition to saving you money, home-made compost can also be a more sustainable choice when you consider that much commercially-produced compost is made from peat. Peat bogs play an important function in keeping carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere; although they cover just 3 per cent of the world’s land surface but they store twice as much carbon as all the world’s forests combined. Peat bogs in Britain alone store carbon equivalent to 20 years’ worth of industrial emissions.
Consequently many respected gardening organisations and well-known gardeners – including the Royal Horticultural Society shows, the National Trust, Chris Beardshaw and Charlie Dimmock – use peat-free compost. Cardiff Council is calling on residents to join them, by home composting.
Cllr Margaret Jones, Executive Member for the Environment said:
“Commercial compost can be expensive, but there’s nothing easier, cheaper, or more satisfying than making your own. Home composting uses garden waste as a resource, and helps keep green waste away from landfill.
“You can also add some kitchen waste such as raw vegetable peelings to your compost bin. And remember, for food waste which can’t be composted, there’s always your food waste caddy.”
Cardiff Council has held a number of sales this year and has sold 575 compost bins and 44 wormeries. Over the course of a year, this equates to 86 tonnes of waste being diverted from Cardiff’s landfill just from residents who bought bins at our sales. Cardiff residents can collect compost bins (£5) wormeries (£20) and waterbutts (£20) from Waste Management Depot, Lamby Way, Rumney, Cardiff, CF3 2HP Mon-Friday 8.30-4.00
Did you know?
- Amateur gardeners account for 69 per cent of all peat sold in the UK
- It takes 1,000 years to replace a metre’s depth of peat
- You can compost bedding used by pets which don’t eat meat (such as hamsters or guinea pigs)
- Compost worms eat half their body weight in food every day. They breed every 7 – 10 days, meaning that the population in a worm bin will double every two to three months
- Placing your compost bin in a sunny spot can speed up the composting process
- You can use your homemade compost to boost all soil types, and to grow all sorts of plants including fruit and vegetables
