queen of the dirt

queen of the dirt

This is a photo from our last visit to the landfill for compost. Since Nate has an extended cab on his truck, the bed was shorter. We both shoveled and I got on top of the pile of dirt and packed it down. It's very loose dirt otherwise and would have blown all over on our drive back home. Plus this way we brought back a lot more dirt than if we had just shoveled. This free compost has turned out to be great for our garden, and saves us quite a few bucks too.

here's what we started with...

We started the day after Earth Day this year with just 2 garden boxes. I thought that was all we were going to start with and try, since this is our first time growing a garden. Our local landfill has free compost, so we shoveled a bunch in the back of Nate's truck and used it for garden soil. So far, it has proven to be very good. Nate added some vermiculite to it, which seems to help also. I've used the free compost for years in my yard in starting new plants. Can't beat free! The cats were very curious as to what we were doing, and Scotty helped dig up some of the weeds. Actually, he made himself a nice, soft, cool dirt spot to lay in while were were getting rid of weeds and grass to make room for the boxes. I like to say he helped, as he did dig out some weeds. I just don't think he knew what was going on.

Next to the 2 boxes is our compost bin. We have since moved it to make room for the other boxes. We have another rotating compost bin that we are in the process of putting together. The one we currently have is ok. I guess it's just not composting as fast as I would like it. We do have quite a lot of worms in the current compost box, which I am happy about. They are some pretty big suckers too! Nate says we should grow worms and sell them. That's another idea for another day. We'll get around to it.