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Decomposer organisms work best with as varied a diet as you feed them. The ingredients are all around us ?almost anything that once lived is a candidate for the compost, so attempt for lots of variety to get a good mix of textures & plant nutrients.

In composting jargon, woody materials that are high in carbon (autumn leaves, paper, peat moss, sawdust, cornstalks, hay & straw, etc) are called ‘brown’ ingredients.

Materials like garden refuse, manure, tea & coffee grounds, feathers, hair, & food scraps are high in nitrogen, or ‘green’

Some materials can actually be both: for example, fresh grass clippings are ‘green’; however, dried grass is ‘brown?.

For successful results, you can use the simple rule that compost needs to be about ½ ‘brown’ & ½ ‘green’ by weight. Do not bother to weigh your ingredients, though ? an estimate is fine.

Composting soon becomes a matter of instinct, like the cook who bakes without a recipe. If the pile does not heat up, you know there’s not enough ‘green’ in the mix, but if you get a smell of ammonia from your pile, you know that it needs more ?brown?.

Materials Good For The Compost

GREEN Foods Algae, Bone meal, Coffee grounds, Egg shells, Feathers, Flowers, Fruit & fruit peels, Grass clippings (fresh), Hair, Manure, Seaweed, Tea leaves, Vegetables & peelings

BROWN Foods: Buckwheat hulls, Coffee filters, Corn cobs, Cotton/wool/silk scraps, Grass clippings (dried), Hay, Leaves (dead), Paper, Peat moss, Pine needles, Sawdust, Straw, Tea bags

This list is far from complete. Anything organic can, in theory, be composted ? some more easily than others. But common sense suggests a few exceptions. Please take heed because if you put any of the following materials in your compost bin, you are asking for trouble. So here goes:

Materials to Avoid:

• Pet wastes can contain very harmful bacteria
• Rotting meat, fish, fats & dairy products are likely to smell & may attract four footed visitors.
• Insect-infested or diseased plants may persist in the compost especially if the compost pile does not heat up very much
• Materials contaminated by synthetic chemicals or treated with herbicides or insecticides should never be used.
• Weeds with mature seeds, & plants with a persistent root system (like crabgrass, ground ivy, or daylilies) may not actually be killed by the heat of the compost
• Leaves of rhubarb & walnut contain substances toxic to insects or other plants so most people select not to compost them.

So now you have it: A list of the materials which can be part of the composting pile & those materials which must be absolutely left out of the compost pile no matter what.

Bio: A gardener for years, Marcelle has learned the value of composting & using it to put nutrients back into the soil. You can download her FREE 12-page Composting MiniHandbook at her blog: http://www.OrganicGardeningClub.com