composting the small way

The general understanding of composting is that the activity is good and it helps improving the soil. Thus nothing is wasted. Decomposition of living matter has been going on for zillion of years. Man is not a necessary party to the way nature sees decomposition. It has been the job of bacteria, and other little insects. Snails and slugs love to bite leaves, and worms love to eat dead leaves and leave their black poo on the ground. Termites will bite woody material to feed the young. So that's how it goes with decomposition.

Now that man values the black gold of humus so much, decomposition becomes a man made adventure. The other day, at Putrajaya Floria 2010, a guy was selling composting machine at RM1000. Man decides to turn composting as a business venture.

But my little vegetable garden in Putrajaya Malaysia, with its constraint of space,  keeps doing it the natural way. The heap will take it's own sweet time, to heat up and transform itself into powdery dark brown material called compost.

a compost heap

another compost heap

yet another compost heap
these are dead banana leaves.

references:
Fundamental Principles of composting ~compost org
Basic Principles of Composting ~LSUAg Center
Composting in the Tropics ll ~infonet-biovision.org

bangchik